


This Hurricane

by bearonthecouch



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Apostates (Dragon Age), Bipolar Anders (Dragon Age), F/M, Gangs and Criminals, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Mages vs. Templars, Mental Health Issues, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-08 02:37:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 19
Words: 64,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17972867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearonthecouch/pseuds/bearonthecouch
Summary: His identity has only ever been made of the things that he is running away from, or standing in active opposition to. Without the Circle, he isn't anything.





	1. Paranoid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even though they were punished for it, isolated and controlled and threatened, the Circle, in every real sense, gave Anders and the other children who'd grown up with him their identities as mages. Without that, he isn't anything.

Tell me, would you kill to save a life?  
Tell me, would you kill to prove you're right?  
Crash, crash and burn, let it all burn.  
This hurricane's chasing us all underground.  
\- 30 Seconds To Mars, Hurricane  
  
I'll write my way out, overwhelm them with honesty.  
This is the eye of the hurricane,  
This is the only way I can protect my legacy.   
\- Hamilton, Hurricane

 

Anders is cold. Alone and cold, and he's certainly felt this kind of miserableness before, but it feels different now. It feels new, and all the more miserable because of its newness. He huddles against the rock, slick with moss and seawater and probably worse things. It smells foul. If he is honest, it smells, overwhelmingly, like shit. He's seen a few things in his time that really disgusted him: the Deep Roads were home to plenty of spectacular horrors. He'd spent some time in the slums of Denerim and among the desperate homeless of Amaranthine, not to mention the refugee camps and caravans along the way. But this is the first place he's ever seen people forced to crowd into the sewers because there is nowhere else for them to scrape a living. This is Darktown. This is Kirkwall. He hates this city with every fiber of his being.

Hunger gnaws at his belly, and it churns into a heavy knot of pain made worse by fear. He is  _afraid_. He is no stranger to stealing food, and money, when he needs to. He'd spent weeks on the road, lifting crops from the fields and coin from the pockets of market-goers. But the guards here pay far more attention, overwhelmed as they are with floods of refugees from Blight-stricken Ferelden. Anders is one of them. He tells himself that, over and over. It's not really a lie. He doesn't have to work very hard to look downtrodden or lost. But he has to remind himself not to draw attention. It's  _hard_. He'd never realized before how - as much as he'd hated the Circle for not letting him  _do_ anything - magic was woven into every part of his life there. Even when they'd taken away his ability to access mana, he could still  _feel_ it, surrounding him, a close pressure. It was woven into the very air of the Tower. How could it not be, with everyone in the place both drawing on mana and creating it just by their very presence?

Even though they were punished for it, isolated and controlled and threatened, the Circle, in every real sense, gave Anders and the other children who'd grown up with him their identities as mages. Without that, he isn't anything.

 _It's your fault_ , whispers the voice in his head, a voice he's  _very_ familiar with after spending almost a full year alone in a cell. The voice of his own doubts and uncertainties is as loud and obnoxious as any demon. Worse, even. More insidious, harder to fight back against. He can't escape his own thoughts and he doesn't want to, because the only way to do that is to die, and he won't let that happen. But he still grinds his teeth. "Shut up!" he mutters.

A few feet down the alley, a woman with tangled dark hair glares at him suspiciously. Anders swallows hard, and ducks his head. Don't draw attention. He's  _not_ crazy. "I'm not crazy," he says, slightly louder than necessary. The woman smiles, and it seems genuine. Anders feels a little bit of warmth. He relaxes a little. The knot in his stomach begins to untangle. He smiles too.

"Where're you from?" the woman asks him, with a noticeable Ferelden accent. It's the slow, rural speech of the farmlands, but there's a harshness behind it, enough for Anders to recognize that she's spent enough time in Kirkwall and cities like it.

The question isn't simple. Not for him and maybe, not for anyone. Amaranthine is a safe enough answer, he figures. But no, that's not right either. He doubts the Wardens would follow him here ( _They wouldn't_ , that voice in his head insists, that desperate, angry voice.  _She wouldn't_ ). But he still doesn't say Amaranthine. He isn't sure if that's because it feels too much like a lie or if it's that residual need to protect himself by not giving anything away. He just shrugs, and shakes his head. "Nowhere," he says. Which feels more or less true.

The woman raises an eyebrow. "Well, aren't you mysterious?" She looks him over, with an intent stare that Anders wants to pull away from. It's obvious that she's intelligent and focused, with the kind of eyes that don't miss anything. "I'd wager you're a soldier, eh?"

Anders shakes his head, instinctively. He's not. He hates fighting. "I'm..." he starts, but then stops himself. He's not anything. Just a ghost.

He begins to turn away, already unsettled by the way this woman's eyes are tracking his every movement. He huddles against the cold wind that blows in like icy knives off the water, cutting through to the bone the second he moves away from the dubious safety provided by the walls of rock.

"You hungry?" the woman asks, and Anders jumps. His heart pounds in his chest, and he is paralyzed, caught between the desire to run and the urge to fight. The woman stares him down with the kind of cautious curiosity that is the only way to stay alive in Kirkwall's rough streets. He almost says no. But although he does not know if he can trust her, one glance around the desperate shantytowns clustered near the docks proves that other options for food are unlikely to come around any time soon. So he nods.

"Well, it ain't much," the woman tells him, honestly. "But it sure is better than nothing." She rummages around in her traveling clothes, pulling a bit of hard tack from a hidden pocket.

Around them, other refugees begin to push in closer, spying a bit of food and willing to kill for it. Anders can feel the threat, a heightened sense of anger in the air. He holds tightly to the biscuit, and his eyes dart wildly from person to person. There are more than he can easily count. The Kirkwall Guard had shoved them all in together, and anyone who complained received the same response: they're welcome to try their luck out on the open sea, if they've got the coin to buy passage on another ship. No one has the coin, that much is obvious. But they are still better off than those on the ships still arriving, holds loaded with people who won't even be let into the city. Sometimes the captains dump the refugees anyway, leaving them to fend for themselves on the other side of Kirkwall's gated walls. Others don't bother, they simply turn around to try their luck at another port, one with a thriving slave market.

So they are stuck here, all of them, languishing here without home or work, but unwilling to leave. Though older people are squeezed into these alleys the same as Anders and his unexpected new friend, it's the younger ones - boys ten and twelve years old - who approach him now, with lean, hardened bodies and narrowed eyes. They are the ones still young enough to fight for survival. Anders has watched these gangs of feral children beating people in the streets, sometimes to death, to get at scraps that a dog wouldn't touch. And he hadn't done a thing to stop them. What could he do, without bringing dangerous attention?

There's the part of him that wants to give up his food, because they're just kids, and he can go hungry. But this isn't Ferelden, where he could do something simple to help someone else and then move on. If he shows that he's willing to just give up whatever they ask for, it'll only make him a permanent target.

He can feel power and potential stirring inside him, his body reacting in its natural way to his very real fear. His head hurts, and his muscles tense up. Exhaustion and starvation and raw panic blend together to make him jumpy. His training as a Grey Warden combines with the reflexes ingrained in him in the Circle, voices that scream at him to fight. He forces himself to breathe, but it grows more difficult as adrenaline overwhelms his ability to calm himself, or think rationally.

The dark-haired woman steps out in front of him. Anders flinches as her hand brushes against his arm, as she pushes him back out of the way. "Get out of here!" she barks, confronting these children without a hint of fear. Anders swallows hard.

The tallest of the boys spits onto the ground, but he hesitates. He watches the woman with uncertain eyes. He does not turn to leave, but he does not advance. One of the other boys doesn't feel the same sense of deference. He lunges forward, launching himself at the woman, and Anders. He knocks her to the ground but ignores her. Anders is the one with the food. The child leaps at him, kicking and clawing and scratching. His small body is a hard target to grab onto, and he fights dirty, moving fast, aiming to quickly incapacitate. His fingers jab at Anders' eyes, and the mage tries to throw the boy off of him, but small fingers close around his throat. Fireworks of pain explode across his body as the boy's companions join the fray. They pummel and kick, doing to Anders what he's seen them do to dozens of others.

It's no longer about the bread, which has fallen to the ground and been trampled into crumbs, a small bit snatched by an observant toddler who streaked away fast as lightning. No, now it's simply about releasing their rage. These boys will take control in the only way available to them, burning up their impotent fury against a helpless target.

But Anders isn't helpless. He is only weak, and afraid, and out of practice. His head spins, and he lashes out with frantic desperation. He grabs at the boy who is on top of him, his foot pressing down, impossibly painfully, on Anders' groin. His knee digs into Anders' stomach. Anders' groans. Darkness crawls at the edges of his vision, but he  _lashes out_ , with raw, uncontrolled magic. A ripple of kinetic force blasts outward, pushing his attackers away. One of them hits the nearby wall with a sickening crack. Anders hears screaming, but he slowly becomes aware that he cannot feel the pain that signals a continuing attack.

He shakes his head, and his vision clears, although his breathing is still labored and heavy. Inside, he is empty. He is shaken. He begins to realize what he's just done, and total panic overwhelms him. He runs.

His breathing comes in painful gasps as he carries himself as far away from the scene of his crime as he can get. He runs blindly, without a care for the people he tramples in the process. His feet slip on the water-slick streets, and he trips over a rotting board, landing hard. Someone grabs his arm, hard, and he cannot pull away. There is nothing left in him to fight with. He spins around to see that same dark-haired woman. Memories mix in his head: another woman, another fight. She hadn't been scared of him either. She had let him kill her. He shakes his head, tears pooling up in his eyes as he squeezes them shut. "No!" he murmurs. "No, no, no..." The image of Rylock's sightless eyes bore into his head, accusing. His fault. He can't control himself. They were right all along,  _she_ was right. He deserves to be locked up. He wraps his arms tightly around himself, too weak to stand. Too weak to fight anymore.

His head snaps backward as a painful slap lands on his cheek. He pulls away, afraid of this woman's touch. But he literally up against a wall, completely drained, too tired to run.

"I'm not crazy," he repeats, completely unconvincingly. His voice is heavy with exhaustion, slurring his speech. He sounds drunk. He wishes that he was.

The woman sits next to him. "You're a mage," she says simply, and with about as much care as if she were remarking on the weather. Anders is still exhausted, but at least he isn't seeing things anymore. And the only voice he's hearing is the one that's actually talking to him.

He feels like someone has suddenly doused him with a bucket of cold water: the danger he is in is all he can think about. The certainty of capture always has brought a strange kind of clarity to the end of his panicked flights.

"Templars," he murmurs, trying to articulate the threat. But the woman doesn't seem at all bothered.

"Eat," she tells him, acting as though she doesn't hear him at all.

She pulls another bit of bread out of her travel sack. Anders can see that there's nothing else left in there, but she won't take no for an answer. So he eats, tearing into the scraps of bread like the starving man he is. It's not enough to satisfy him. It wouldn't be enough for even a normal man. For someone with a Grey Warden appetite, the tiny meal is only a terrible tease. Pain still rips at his stomach. His skin is pale, the veins visible underneath are unnaturally dark. He knows that if he could see his reflection, his eyes would be sunken and bloodshot.

"You look terrible," the woman says gently, and he can only nod. And wonder why she's helping him. And wonder why no one seems to be chasing after either of them anymore. "Feel better?" she asks. Anders swallows the last of the crumbs, and nods, even though he's mostly lying. The look on the woman's face proves he's not fooling anyone, but she must also realize by now that she's given up everything she can. More than she should've. "Come on, then," she orders, with the sound of a woman expecting to be obeyed. Anders is already on his feet and following her before he realizes that it's the same tone that had slowed the gang leader at the beginning of the fight.

"Who  _are_ you?" he asks, curiosity mixed with outright awe.

"My name is Lirene. I take care of people around here." She pushes open a hastily bolted door that opens into a Darktown shack like any other, walls formed mostly of shipping crates and other miscellaneous debris. Anders has always been impressed by how resourceful the slum-dwellers of most cities are when it comes to constructing their houses. "You'd be surprised how far a little kindness can take you," Lirene insists as she practically shoves Anders into what must be her home.

On a cot in the corner lies the boy Anders had thrown against the wall in his desperate fight. His wounds have been cleaned up, though not bandaged. Blood and bruises stand out even against his sun-darkened skin. Though his eyes are open and track Anders' movement as he approaches, he doesn't react to any of the conversation. He doesn't even move when Anders sits on the cot next to him. His skin feels disturbingly cold when Anders takes his hand.

He sends a bit of calming magic into the boy, using the touch as a conduit. The child relaxes, leaning against Anders, without fear or protest. Anders gently lays him down on the cot, watching him sleep.

"What happened to him?" he asks softly.

"He's high on Haze," Lirene replies. "Most of them are. It kills the hunger, for a while."

Anders sighs. He combs his fingers through the boy's hair, trailing flickers of blue light as he does so. Looking at him like this, all he can see is a vulnerable child, one that he hurt, and could've killed. He can feel the corrupted lyrium inside the boy's body. It's the only reason he's able to heal the child; without the added boost from the drug, he'd be too drained to manage even something as simple as this.

"Who controls the drugs?" he asks, as the worst of the young gang member's cuts and scrapes fade.

Lirene shrugs. "Coterie. And there's a few other small-timers of course."

"And the Guard doesn't do anything to stop them? Or the Chantry?" The Chantry is supposed to control the lyrium supply. There'd be no way to make these dangerous derivative cocktails for sale on the streets if they were doing their job. Anders has no love for the Chantry, but it infuriates him that they can expend so much energy controlling  _people,_ mages who have done nothing wrong, only to let criminals profit from the suffering of others, suffering caused by their lack of control over a physical  _object_  that they are supposed to keep safely locked away.

Lirene laughs at that, a harsh bark with no humor in it. "You think the Chantry cares about what happens down here? Don't be stupid."

Anders nods, conceding the point. Their apathy is what lets him hide, after all. Well, their apathy, and the occasional short-term alliance with a sympathetic civilian. It's always been that way, since he was a teenager. Ducking templars here isn't any different from doing the same thing in the villages of Ferelden. Right?

He holds Lirene's gaze, trying to read her. He likes to think he's fairly good instincts regarding people, that he can figure out who to trust. But it's harder when there's that part of him that won't stop insisting (with proof that he doesn't want to remember) that he can't trust  _anybody._ "Why are you helping me?" he asks carefully.

"Because you need help," she replies immediately. As if there's nothing else to it.

Anders doesn't believe it. Not for a second. He raises an eyebrow. "And?"

People aren't just nice for free, in his experience.  _Especially_  not in this city. There's always a catch.

Lirene sinks into the chair across the table from him. It's the first time he's been able to pick up on the should've-been-obvious fact that she's just as exhausted and hungry as anyone else here. "And I've seen what you can do," she admits. "The people here need you."

He shakes his head before she even finishes speaking. No way. "Do you have any idea what you're asking?" His voice shakes, just a little, as he tries to make her  _understand_.

It's true that this woman helped him when she had no reason to, it's true that she's not the one turning him in. But if she's even half as well-informed about this city as she seems to be, she must know the kind of bounty Kirkwall's Knight Commander is offering on any information leading to the capture of a mage.

"Do you think they haven't already run to the templars, boy? As many as saw you out there?  _Someone_ has."

It's true. He knows it's true. That's what scares him. He's already started running through all of his possible options. He's still a Warden.  _Maybe_ that can save him. It's a long shot, but it's possible, isn't it? He's never been the type to just give up, he's always been able to talk a good game. Maybe, maybe, maybe... he turns the wheels over in his head, but his stomach still hurts. He can't shake the feeling that his luck has run out again, because it  _always does._

"I can protect you," Lirene tells him.

"No you can't!" he snaps. She's already more involved than he wants her to be. He's sick of other people getting hurt because of him.

"I  _can_. But only if you want me to."

Anders finally nods. What other choice does he have, really?


	2. Hollow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _You're just scared_ , nags that anxious voice in his own head. He tells that voice to shut up. He has a good reason to be scared. He has a lot of good reasons.

"So tell me the truth," Lirene insists. She's leaning against the slick, moss-covered stone that makes up one wall of a half-cave structure shored up by some rotting boards. It'll be Anders' home, if he wants it. If he can make it habitable, which he is beginning to seriously doubt. "What are you doing here?"

Anders snorts softly as he begins piling up the worst of the debris strewn about the floor. A runaway mage like him coming to Kirkwall is suicidal, and they both know it. It's a totally fair question.

"I have a friend in the city," he says softly, more a reminder to himself than a response.

Lirene shakes her head, her eyes wide with disbelief. "It sure looks to me like this friend is taking real good care of you."

Anders stops. Anger and exhaustion war inside him. He still holds sharp bits of broken metal in his hands. They prick at his fingers. "Shut up," he snarls. "You don't know anything about me. Or him."

Lirene says nothing. She concentrates on gathering up the few salvageable bits of trash she might be able to use. Her willingness to not ask questions is one of the things about her that Anders already appreciates and is impressed by. They work for a while, in not-exactly-comfortable silence. Anders scrubs down the few scattered empty crates that will serve as the little bit of furniture he needs. The past couple of days have been long and cold and draining, but the templars have not come to hunt him down. He knows it's Lirene's doing, although he still doesn't know how she has power enough to keep him hidden. Or why she wants to.

He sits down, perching on the edge of the still-damp crate. "Thank you," he murmurs.

Lirene squeezes his shoulder gently. "You let me know if you need anything. I'll be back to check on you in the morning."

Anders nods, still listless and tired. He watches the door slam shut behind her.

Outside, the wind blows fierce and freezing. The sunlight seems to last for only a precious few hours in the middle of these winter days. And only a fraction of that reaches down to where they are. So even though it's barely mid-afternoon, he sits alone in the dark.

He takes a deep breath, then blows it out. He feels the mana stirring around him and inside him. It fills him with a warm charge, an energy that needs to  _go_ somewhere. So he latches on to it, and shapes it, in his mind and in reality. He plays with flickering sparks of fire, watching them dance in his palm. It's an exercise that takes serious effort, for him, he's never been good at primal. But it helps him to not-think. He uses only a trickle of mana, so little that it would be impossible for anyone to track, even if they were sitting right on top of him. But even this little bit helps him to relax a little. He can feel the knots of tension in his shoulders beginning to untangle themselves. The weight he'd been carrying, the weight of fear and uncertainty and not-being-good-enough, eases slightly, as he loses himself in that fire. He dumps all that emotional energy into the spell, focusing on  _making_. It works for a little while, but not long enough. Questions and doubts begin to creep in at the edges of his consciousness. He could push past them if he needed to, but his connection to the Fade these days is weak and fragile, and he tells himself it's better to stop while he's ahead.  _You're just scared,_ nags that anxious voice in his own head. He tells that voice to shut up. He has a good reason to be scared. He has a lot of good reasons.

He lets the fire snap out, but not before lighting a few scraps of wood to keep himself warm. He watches them crackle and burn, and he pulls out a few scraps of parchment and a stub of charcoal that he'd dug up from somewhere and held onto, and he begins to draw. Years-old memories rush to the surface, and he sketches out those images. His fingers trace over the rips in the paper, causing the smooth arching lines to trip and stutter. He draws clear bright eyes and carefully groomed hair. He fills in the shape of muscular arms that had once wrapped themselves tightly around him when he couldn't sleep. He gnaws on his lower lip as he sketches the fingers that had once teased him. He adds a lazy smile to Karl's face, one that matches his own. His breathing quickens as he draws, and he has to put the picture down unfinished. It's too hard to think about this. Too much time has passed. Too much, and not enough at the same time. He'd never been sure if...  _whatever_ he'd felt for Karl was even returned. Mages in the Tower, even when they had sex, didn't generally talk about their feelings. He didn't know, until he'd read Karl's letters, that there was something lasting in their brief liaison. Or at least, that Karl might have wanted it to last.

He'd burned Karl's notes, but not before he'd memorized everything about them: the familiar curls and sharp lines of his too-close-together handwriting, the visceral panic that seemed to bleed through the words, even though everything he'd actually written was totally benign. He'd asked for help, a pull that Anders couldn't resist because he could feel the desperation hidden in the simple things, words and pictures that are your only way of communicating with an outside world that couldn't hear you. Except that, somehow, Karl had been able to smuggle his words out, and get them to someone who  _would_ listen. Of course Anders had to come here. Even though he has no idea what he can do to help his friend. Nothing, probably. Just as much nothing as Karl, or Rhyanon, or anybody else could do for him when he asked.

He falls asleep eventually, though that sleep is fragmented and restless. Old memories work their way into his dreams, he can feel the lingering ghosts of warmth and touch and comfort; he remembers whispering secrets. And he remembers hiding things. Making plans. Guilt sinks into his stomach like a rock, and it still hurts when he wakes up. The last time he'd run away from the Tower, it had been with an explosive burst of anger, after Karl had been sent away. Almost three years ago. How much has changed since then? Yet Karl hadn't given up on him. There is one last connection tying him to the Circle, pulling him to Kirkwall, a leash that just won't break. And then he feels bad for thinking of Karl as only that. He owes the man so much more.

He pushes himself up and wraps himself in as many layers of clothing as he can, to brave the pre-dawn winter. He follows the winding path at the very edges of the docks, twisting around the grasping fingers of wood and rock and water. The waves churn in dark swirls that crash against the breakwater and send up freezing spray. Sporadic patches of ice make the walk more treacherous than usual.

There is something important that he has to do. He concentrates on that. There is a meeting he has to get to. He's been planning it for a long time. He has to be on time.  _Something very, very bad will happen._

He frowns, kneading at his forehead with his knuckles, as if he could somehow erase that shocking, certain thought. Nothing he does seems to help, though. There is no coaxing away the painful weight of dread. There's no qualifier he can think of. Something bad will happen. Not a question of if, but when.

He knows it's coming, although he isn't sure exactly what, just that whatever it is will hurt, and that he won't be able to fight it. The feeling is familiar even if the circumstances are slightly different. He knows he's walking into a trap, but he walks into it anyway. It seems better to just get it over with, whatever it is. Even the wind seems to push him forward, biting even through his layers of clothing. He ducks his head, tucking himself into as tight a ball as he can in an effort to stay warm, and he walks. He keeps walking.

The claustrophobic press of Darktown, with its makeshift buildings all falling on top of each other, begins to ease. It doesn't happen all at once, but the streets eventually widen, and shadows give way to open sky. The weather is still cold and miserable, but it seems less so up here in a part of Kirkwall that seems, somehow, more real. There is a life to this place that the people of Darktown have forgotten. Even at this time of day, so early that it barely qualifies as morning, there are people moving about. There are merchants sweeping out market stalls, and children running through the streets. He hears humming and laughter, and these people do not move with the violent cruelty that is all he's seen in the sewers and refugee camps. It's like they come from another world entirely, one that Anders has occasionally visited but is not entirely sure he knows how to fit into.

Still, their mood is contagious. Anders feels a burst of optimism, blossoming outward from his heart. A kind of vibrant energy reaches out to his fingers and his feet. His head seems to clear a little. His pace quickens. He smiles, and even begins to whistle, and, except for a few stray, nagging doubts, he isn't even afraid. His confidence blooms as he ascends the wide stone steps to the Chantry's front entrance, and no one even looks at him twice.

He pushes open the heavy wooden door with cautious slowness. It creaks and slams shut behind him despite his best efforts to let it close softly. The echoes of that slamming take a long time to fade away.

The place is nearly empty. A few pink-clothed women wander, lighting candles and dusting statues. Most of them are young, barely teenagers. Initiates, still sleepy, performing their chores by rote. Anders smiles as he passes them, not  _at_ them, but at his memory of once being where they are. A kind of confusion stirs inside his stomach, a sharp, nagging pain, a question that wants to be asked but will not fully form. Something about sides, some warning bell that tells him he should be afraid - not of them, but of what they might become. Anders does his best to ignore the unsettling clouds of thoughts that won't make themselves clear enough to be understood. He makes his way toward the front of the chapel, where a man sits, tucked into the corner of the very first bench.

Even from the back, Karl's shape is familiar. Anders grins, and he barely stops himself from breaking into a run. He laughs softly as his plans to tease the man bring words, already formed, to his lips. But he hesitates. There is still that tiny bit of uncertainty, that fear that Karl will not forgive him for moving on without him, that the distance that has been forced between them might not be able to be closed. It's happened before.

And every time it happens, it hurts more.

Karl's the one that asked for help this time, but Anders finds, as he slips into the pew beside the man, that he's about to ask for advice the same way he had when he was still just a teenage kid, equal parts cocky and afraid. He's a lot less cocky these days.

"Are you okay?" he asks softly, still not looking at his old friend. It's a comfortable vague question, one he'd never answered, but one that still - always - needed to be asked. It was a way of gently beginning the kind of conversation that could never take place solely in words. It was a way of saying  _I'm scared_ , without actually having to say it, and as he formed the words that were more real than the jokes he'd wanted to tell only seconds earlier, Anders went somewhere else. Only in his head, obviously. In reality, he was very definitely still sitting on the first bench in a long row of them inside the Kirkwall Chantry. He was sitting next to Karl. In his head, he was also sitting next to Karl, but in his head they were both sitting on a thin, only-marginally-comfortable mattress pressed up next to a mostly unused bookcase. In his head, Karl was tracing his fingers down Anders' naked back, and not-asking the same question:  _Are you okay?_

The flickering images of his memory don't last very long; a few seconds, at most. But the feelings linger, clinging to Anders like a hazy fog. He reaches out for Karl's hand, but the other man didn't react. "Look, I'm sorry," Anders murmurs. He waits for Karl to say something. His friend had always been the quiet type, but this feels different. Frightening. Anders wraps his arms around his knees, an old protective instinct, and he finally glances up, to look at Karl. He braces himself for whatever disappointed, not-quite-angry reaction the man is almost certain to have. Times like this, it's obvious that Karl had once been his  _teacher_ , capable of lecturing the same as any of them. Worse, because Anders actually cared to listen to him.

"You've come," Karl says, his voice oddly flat.

Anders nods. "'Course I did." He voice comes out hoarse, and very quiet. A shiver runs down his spine.

"Why?" Karl asks. It's that old teacher voice, probing questions, trying to make Anders  _think_ , to see the flaws in his rash, illogical actions. The implied condemnation stings, but Anders is just as stubborn and competitive as he'd always been.

"Because you asked!" he snaps. He waits for Karl to reply, but his impatience grows, the same as it always has, while he waits for the other man to collect his thoughts. "Dammit, Karl, look at me!"

He is  _so_ afraid of rejection. But he  _asked_. Anders clings to that knowledge, hoping that it means he hasn't permanently lost one of the only real friends he's ever had. Karl looks up, responding to the command. He stares at Anders with deadened eyes.

A cold shock roots Anders to the spot. He frowns in confusion, trying to reconcile the visual evidence and the emotional  _lack_ of evidence _,_ lack of anything. He tries and fails to come up with a way that this makes sense, because it doesn't. It hurts too much to make sense. Karl is there but not there, and waves of pain crash over Anders in layers that hurt with as much force as a physical blow.

"What happened?" he asks, stupidly. He is barely able to choke out the words.

"I am Tranquil," Karl replies, without the irritation he should have displayed at the obviousness of the question. Anders is more chilled than ever. A choking sob fails to work its way out of his throat. Hot tears sting his cheeks.

"You are crying," Karl observes. Anders nods.

As he tries to wrap his mind around the pain he's feeling, he remembers how desperately Karl had once tried to protect him from getting hurt. Rhyanon had cared too, but she'd always viewed the templars' punishments as inevitable. Sometimes, she broke the rules at his side, but Karl had been the first one - the  _only_ one - to insist that it didn't have to happen like this. He'd seen something in Anders other than an irredeemable screw-up. He was also the only one who'd told Anders, out loud, that he didn't deserve the punishments he endured. And now that fist squeezing around Anders' heart tightens, cold as ice, as he realizes how  _subversive_ that would sound to the Chantry. To say, out loud, that mages don't deserve to be punished... it might be the most dangerous thing anyone could ever say.

He sees Karl in a whole new way, now, only after it's already too late to do anything to save him. He breaks down completely, his shoulders shaking as he sobs.

"You should leave this place," Karl tells him, in a terrifyingly emotionless monotone.

"Come with me," Anders begs him.

But Karl shakes his head. "I should not. My presence would be missed."

 _No. No, no, no._ Anders tries to think around the denial screaming in his head.  _This can't happen_.  _It isn't fair_.

He can fix it. He has to be able to fix it. Mages can will things into being, right? Karl is the one who told him that in the first place.

Anders screams, unintelligible, overwhelming, an animal yell that still isn't strong enough to vent his rage and pain. He grabs Karl's arm, tightly enough to hurt. He needs Karl to listen to him, to really see him. He needs him to  _be there_.

The nearest of the Chantry Initiates, a tiny wisp of a girl, watches the confrontation with wide eyes, but she makes no attempt to interfere.

"Let go," Karl says simply.

Anders does, immediately. It shouldn't be possible for his stomach to hurt anymore, but it does as soon as he realizes that he's hurting his friend. He can't. He won't.

He and Rhyanon and Jowan had made a promise to each other, one night in the kitchens, when they were just drunk enough to talk, out loud, about their reality. They all swore they'd rather be dead than Tranquil. But that was a long time ago. And Karl hadn't been part of that pact.

"Are you happy?" Anders whispers. He immediately wants to take it back, because by definition, the Tranquil  _can't_ be happy. But he still can't reconcile his knowledge of the Tranquil with his memories of  _Karl_ , who, even if he'd never been wildly, excitedly ecstatic the way Anders wanted him to be, was often content, in his own quiet way.

"No," Karl replies. His brows are knotted in confusion as he struggles, probably, to figure out why Anders looks displeased about his honest response. He waits for an interminably long time before speaking again. "You should go," he repeats, and Anders knows more than ever that Karl is right. He nods, still struggling to swallow over the lump in his throat that won't go away. He doesn't even bother trying to stop his crying.

Karl reaches out, his fingers closing over Anders'. They still feel warm. Anders can feel the heat of the blood pumping underneath the pale flesh. "Do not be upset," Karl insists. "I am okay."


	3. Healing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a certain comfort to the familiar awareness that he could so easily die. But not today, he tells himself, even though he can't exactly pinpoint a good reason. Why _not_ today?

The walk back to Darktown is long and lonely. The shadows seem colder than ever before. Anders can't feel anything but the heavy weight of guilt and regret swirling in the pit of his stomach. His footsteps carry him forward, but it's more inertia than anything else keeping him moving. In his mind, insistent whispers pull at him, forcing him to stop every few steps and remind himself that he cannot go back to the Chantry. Karl will not be there anymore, and even if he were, there is nothing Anders can do to change things. He'd only get himself killed. There's a certain comfort to the familiar awareness that he could so easily die. But not today, he tells himself, even though he can't exactly pinpoint a good reason. Why  _not_ today?

It takes him longer than it should to notice the tears still splashing down his cheeks. He wipes them away slowly, and keeps to the emptier alleyways.

Footsteps clatter behind him as he nears the hovel that has become his home. He whirls around, barely managing to keep himself from falling as he does so. "Thank the Maker I found you!" Lirene gasps, as she pushes a semi-conscious young woman into his arms. "Where were you anyway?"

Anders blinks, struggling to come to terms with the sudden overwhelming rush of sensory input. He catches the girl awkwardly, and it takes effort not to let her fall. It feels as though all of the strength has left his body. The young woman in his arms lets out a pitiful sound halfway between a gasp and a moan; a painful, gurgling breath. Anders is frighteningly aware of the warmth of her blood pooling onto his clothes.

"I can't," he chokes out. He pleads helplessly with Lirene, who offers him no way out whatsoever. She's pushing open his door, not bothering to be subtle about it's fidgety lock, which is probably irreparably broken now. The girl still struggles in Anders' arms.

Flickers of something intensely, dangerously familiar ignite around her. Anders feels his breath catch somewhere in his middle before the air gets all the way in or out. He stumbles into the darkened room and drops the girl onto the table, wincing slightly at how hard she hits the unforgiving surface. She moans again, more weakly this time, and Anders grabs her hand.

She squeezes back, and he finds himself talking to her, in fragmented sentences meant to reassure himself as much as her. He draws in a sharp breath as he feels her instinctively pulling mana from him to reinforce her body's attempts to heal itself. And she's  _strong_. That kind of power, unguided, could hurt more than in helps.

Anders can't focus on anything but the chaotic energy of her mana mixing with his. He shuts down, throwing up a block so that she can't take anything more from him. And he forces himself to breathe, slow and deep.

"What happened?" he asks Lirene, as he puts pressure on the deep gash cutting across the girl's belly. She cries out, still only half-conscious, but she begins to kick and fight. Anders can feel the buildup of power gathering around her. He curses and presses her shoulder down, needing to keep her still.

"Give me that potion!" he snaps, pointing to the neatly organized shelf behind her. "The green one." Lirene grabs it and hands it to him, and Anders' tilts the unconscious girl's head back, propping her mouth open. The dark green syrup slides down her throat, and Anders prays that she won't resist it. His panic ebbs as she falls into an unnatural sleep. The drug will ease the pain, and prevent her from casting. "Looks like a knife fight," he says softly. He glances up to Lirene for confirmation, although he really doesn't need it.

True to form, she doesn't feel the need to tell him what he already knows. Instead, she makes herself useful, digging through his cabinets for bandages.

"Did you know she's a mage?" Anders asks, as he takes the strips of cloth. His voice is starting to regain a bit more insistent force. It's like he's beginning to wake up. It's not a good feeling. Hostile anger stirs in his muscles, and he's practically shaking with the effort it takes to hold back his urge to punch something.

"There were rumors," Lirene replies softly. "Athenril's pet firestarter."

The girl is still bleeding. Her life, as it spills over Anders' fingers, is sticky and dark, almost black. Her body begins to convulse, reacting to the pressure as he tries desperately to close that wound, to knit her flesh back together. Her pulse, in those brief moments when he can feel it flickering against her skin, is thready and weak. Her flesh is too pale, even for someone living the sunless existence of Darktown.

Anders dumps all of his rage and frustration into the effort it takes to heal. There's no time for finesse, even if he was capable of it in his current state, and he isn't. He can't focus. He can barely control his own power, and he's desperately afraid of what might happen if he gets this wrong. He bites his lip, unaware that he's doing it until he tastes blood. When he glances at Lirene, she's still there, standing a few feet away, leaning against the doorframe, standing guard. But she turns back to him and gives him a small nod. She believes he's capable of doing this. Maker knows why.

After that moment of distraction, Anders feels slightly calmer. He turns back to the girl. Her hands are clammy and her breathing is still shallow and rasping. He can feel the mana inside her, bright and raw. He latches onto that, using it to guide him as his vision begins to darken at the edges. He can't see much of anything beyond flashes of bright light. He thinks he can feel his fingers slipping away from the heat of the girl's skin. He feels something soft sliding under his head, and then there's nothing but darkness.

When he blinks his eyes open again, it takes a minute to come to terms with the way his body feels: sensitive, and raw. The light coming in through the cracks in the wall, meager though it is, is still too bright. The texture of the rough blanket clutched in his hand is almost painfully scratchy.

"Here," Lirene insists, shoving a bowl of oatmeal into his hands. "Eat."

Anders licks his lips experimentally. His throat is painfully dry. His head feels heavy. But he knows he has to get something into his stomach.

"Thank you," he whispers. His voice comes out more hoarsely than he'd intended.

"Shut up and eat," Lirene tells him.

Anders nods. He lets his eyes slip closed once more, reaching inside to try to dredge up some last embers of mana. But there's nothing. He'd drained himself. Completely. He's not supposed to do that. He's not supposed to  _let himself_ do that, and he can't remember how it happened. Somehow, when that girl - that other  _mage_ \- was bleeding out in front of him, everything he'd previously learned had ceased to matter. It terrifies him. He cannot let it go.

He opens his eyes again, somehow imagining that he'll see her, still sitting there nearby. Within reach. But the only other person inside his small hovel is Lirene, who frowns down at the bowl of oatmeal that still remains mostly untouched on his lap.

"Where is she?" Anders asks. His voice comes out a little too sharply, a little bit more loudly then he intended. He winces, but Lirene barely seems to notice.

She shrugs. "Not here," she says simply. As though that's all there is to it.

"You let her go?" A spike of panic stabs at Anders' stomach. He starts tapping his leg up and down. It takes effort to maintain eye contact with Lirene. He pushes forward, breathless and terrified. "What if…? She'll need time to heal!"

Somehow losing this girl seems like the worst thing that could possibly happen. Lirene seems oblivious to his distress.

"I wasn't going to stop her," she says calmly. "Hawk can make her own decisions same as you."

Anders frowns. He forces himself to take a breath. He calms his body as best he can. He tucks his leg underneath him so that his jitteriness will be less obvious. "Hawk?" he repeats.

Lirene shrugs. "It's what they call her."

It's a gang name. Anders isn't stupid enough to pretend it isn't. The girl was dying in his arms last night, and now she's... what? Thrown back into the streets?

And she's a  _mage_. He can still feel the imprint of her mana, like a fingerprint left inside him. It'll fade, probably soon, but for now it's still there, an echo of her presence, binding her to him. Making him responsible for her. "Do you have any idea what kind of danger she's in?" he manages to choke out.

"No more than you," Lirene replies calmly. "Less, I'd wager. She can look after herself."

"So can I!"

"That isn't what I meant and you damn well know it. She can use those knives she carries."

Anders blinks. He doesn't remember the girl carrying knives, but then he doesn't remember much beyond frantically trying to stabilize her and stop the bleeding. "So can other people," he mutters darkly. "She didn't win that fight she was in last night." To his surprise, Lirene doesn't bother to argue that point. "Where can I find her?"

The look Lirene gives him is compassionate, but there's no mistaking her pity. Anders avoids it instinctively, tucking his head into his hands. He's not broken. He wishes people would stop looking at him like that.

Lirene sits down on the edge of the bed next to him, and gently takes the bowl from his lap. "You know what I've learned?" she says softly. "If you let yourself get obsessed with saving everyone, you'll blind yourself to what they actually need."

Anders is in no mood to listen to platitudes. A restless energy fills him.

Lirene looks around, muttering a few unintelligible words to herself. "You're going to need better furniture," she announces after a moment. Anders blinks. "And supplies. Medicines and things."

"What are you talking about?"

Lirene sighs, as if her response should be more than obvious, and maybe it should be. "Callin needed a healer," she says calmly. "And she's far from the only one who does, or will."

Anders nods, and a tired smile immediately lights up Lirene's face. She's gotten him to agree to something before he's had time to think it through, but the agreement makes her happy, and that's worth doing. She'd told him before that this was what she wanted. Magical healing is rare even within the Circles. Finding someone like him, an apostate willing to help the people of Darktown who can offer nothing in return, Lirene can't pass up an opportunity like that. Yes, she's using him, but at the same time, she's making him brave enough to do what he was always the best at doing. It seems like a fair trade.

Lirene lets go of him, breaking the moment, and Anders watches as she busies herself cleaning up after the daily messes he doesn't bother with. She runs her hand over the dust that gathers in deep layers over the table.

Anders stands up, begins to follow Lirene around the small room. "Do you know her?" he asks.

He's back to trying to track down the mage girl from last night, but Lirene doesn't seem bothered. His obsessive focus proves he'll be tenacious, that he genuinely will do everything in his power to help the people who need him. It's worth it.

"As well as I know any of them," she admits, in answer to the healer's question. She sits on a crate across from him, and sets two new cups of tea on the table. "It's all rumors and secrets down here. I've seen her grow up a bit though. Helped her out of a few tight spots."

Anders stares at her for a couple of long seconds. "Why aren't you afraid of me?" he finally asks.

"Should I be?"

"I dunno. Most people are."

"I don't frighten easily."

Anders nods. He can believe that.

He asks again where he can find the girl from last night. Lirene sighs, looking as though answering the question goes against her better judgement, and it probably does. "Please," he says softly. "You brought her to me because she needed help. I can't just forget about her."

"You'll just go after her, with or without me, won't you?"

"I need to talk to her," Anders insists stubbornly.

Lirene studies him for a long moment, then finally throws up her hands. But a tiny smile plays across her face. "She'll be in the alienage, most likely."

Anders frowns. "She's not an elf."

"It's Athenril's ground. And the safest place for someone with her... particular secrets."

"The templars don't come there?" Anders asks, too quickly.

"Don't go getting too excited. They do their sweeps, same as anywhere. But the elves don't take too kindly to having their home trampled on without good reason."

Anders nods. It makes a certain kind of sense. A rush of energy flows through him, a kind of light, for the first time since the disastrous meeting with Karl in the Chantry the day before. "You brought her to me on purpose, didn't you?" he asks Lirene, as he pulls a coat on over his ragged clothes.

"Yes, I did," Lirene tells him firmly. "She needed a healer, and I knew you would help." With that, she heads out the door.

Anders follows only a few seconds afterward, but it's already impossible to tell which way the woman went. The alleyways of Darktown snake around in a confusing maze, ending abruptly or extended whenever someone felt a need. Anders sighs, and pushes his way toward the alienage, relying on the position of the winter sun in the sky to help him navigate. He's never found reason to head for that section of the city, but the large, gnarled tree growing in the center of that neighborhood is an easy landmark.

"What're you doing here,  _shem_?" sneers a dirty, too-skinny boy whose fingers wrap tightly around a knife, the minute he crosses some unseen boundary that divides the elven ghetto from the rest of the city.

"I'm looking for the Hawk," Anders says, putting an edge of intimidation into his voice. The child spits on the ground.

"You won't find no Hawk here," he insists. But he glances backward, at a crumbling house across the square. Anders smiles, and a look of fear steals over the boy's face as recognition dawns. He runs, then, darting into another of the ubiquitous alleyways in a matter of seconds.

Anders gathers his mana as he walks toward the dwelling, a poor shack like all the others here, but larger than most. He breathes deeply as the coils of power flood through his body. Through heightened senses, he is aware of an arrow trained on him. He holds his arms up, showing his lack of weaponry - not that he relies on steel. "I'm only here to talk," he announces.

"Your kind isn't welcome here," calls a voice, from above his head.

Anders lets a smile quirk onto his face. "Liar," he replies, secure in the knowledge that they are protecting at least one human mage only a few steps away from where he stands.

The door to the house opens abruptly, and a hard-faced elven female of indeterminate age steps out to meet him. Her dark red hair frames her severe features and calls attention - purposely, Anders is sure - to her multiple scars. "You are bold, to come here and insult my people."

"Fortune favors the bold."

The elf laughs, an open guffaw that leaves her shoulders shaking. But the laughter stops as abruptly as it had begun. "I know of you, healer," she tells him, in a voice laced with threat. "What are you doing here?"

"I wasn't lying. I'm here to talk. Just tell the Hawk I'm here. I'll leave if  _she_ asks me to."

Athenril narrows her eyes, and Anders is keenly aware of how quickly the gang leader could draw any of the knives strapped about her armor. "By what right do you call her?"

"I saved her life."

"So you say."

"Ask her."

Athenril nods. "Very well. I will do so."

She retreats into the building as quickly as she appeared. Her guards still keep their weapons trained on Anders, and the sensation of eyes upon him has only grown more intense as dozens of the alienage's residence pay attention - furtively - to the spectacle his presence here creates. The door to the house creaks open again, more slowly and cautiously this time, and the dark-haired human girl Anders instantly recognizes steps out. She hovers close to the doorway and regards him cautiously, though with the careful, searching eyes that no doubt gave her the name of a bird of prey. Anders catches her eyes and smiles. She does not return the friendly overture. "What do you want?" she asks sullenly.

"Is there somewhere more private we could go?"

"You don't know me," the girl called Hawk demands.

"You're right," Anders replies simply. He will not take her away from the place where she feels safe, and he tells her that. "I just wanted to make sure that you're alright." He too is capable of studying a person, looking for answers. He lets his eyes take in the bandage wrapped tightly about her torso, notices the way she walks, gingerly, and with pain evident in her features.

"I don't need your help!" the girl snaps.

Everything about her is lean and predatory, defensive, but Anders can easily see past all that to how young she is, still a teenager, with hints of childhood innocence still visible despite the guardedness of her posture and the hardness in her eyes. Her mana still pulls at him, wild and hot and barely controlled, like a newly-lit fire. 'Athenril's pet firestarter,' Lirene had called her. Anders isn't surprised.

"That's not what Lirene told me," he tells the girl. Something noticeably changes in her, the moment he mentions the Fereldan woman's name. She relaxes slightly, and her eyes flicker nervously to Anders. It's not exactly a ringing endorsement of trust, but it's  _something._ She says nothing, but by now Anders likes to think he's pretty good at interpreting various silences.

"I'm not going to make you do anything," he tells her, once again. "I just wanted you to know that I'm... around. In case you ever want to talk."

"About mage stuff?" She sneers the word, and Anders flinches. She wouldn't be the first of them to hate what she is, but that self-loathing hits him like a punch to the gut.

"About anything," he hedges. "Look, I meant what I said. I'll leave if you ask me to."

"You  _should_ ," she insists.

"Probably. I'm not all that good at doing what I should."

The girl smiles shyly. The expression looks out of place, like it's not something she does very often. "Me neither," she admits.

Anders reaches out and runs a hand over the bandaged wound. Hawk winces and stifles a cry. Anders sucks in a breath. "Can I?" he asks softly. He had drained himself attempting to fix her the night before, but mana is everywhere. It replenishes itself easily, if allowed to. It's never gone for more than a few hours, unless the choice isn't his to make.

The girl called Hawk holds his gaze for a long moment, searching for the catch. He can read the doubt in her as clearly as if she were speaking it aloud -  _more_ clearly, if he wants to be honest. But she finally nods.

Anders smiles, relieved that he won't have to decide whether to leave her in pain or cast without the permission. He finishes the prior night's job with a shallow, simple healing spell. It washes over him like cool water after the pain of his previous attempt. The girl gasps as the icy shock of mana flows into her, and then, to Anders' surprise, she takes over, weaving the power he's provided her with simple, focused ease. Anders drops his spell, his concentration shaken.

"You can't do that by accident!" he accuses, as though she is, somehow,  _cheating_.

That mysterious smile reappears on her face, more confident this time. "You don't know me," she reminds him, and Anders is now more aware of the fact then ever. It  _bothers_ him, more than it should.

"Get out of here," she orders, and there is an authority to her voice despite her youth.

Anders nods. "I meant what I said, Hawk," he says, as he walks, slowly and deliberately, out of the alienage. "Come find me."

 


	4. Lonely

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He tells himself that loneliness is a price worth paying, if it is the cost of freedom.

Anders desperately needs distraction. He can't stop pacing, can't calm down even enough to think. And somehow, Lirene is waiting for him before he even manages to push the door to her shop all the way open. She's only half dressed, and her hair spills over her shoulders in loose tangles. Dust swirls around her in the fading light, clouds caught in the last traces of sunset. Anders clears his throat awkwardly, feeling his cheeks heat up as he turns to flee.

"Sorry," he chokes out. "I'll just... go."

"Don't," Lirene orders, as she quickly pulls on a clean shirt. Anders stops, and sits down in an empty chair. He looks around the room, taking in the things he's somehow never noticed before: the bed, the well kept dresser... the things that make the place a home.

"I don't think I've ever been here... you know, alone... before," he admits.

Lirene smiles. "That curtain's usually up, when the store's open. You're not the first to forget I live here."

Anders nods again, just to acknowledge that he's listening. He still feels slightly dazed. It takes him longer than it should to recognize the warmth of Lirene's fingers wrapped in his.

"It's going to be a little bit hard to get some of the things you'll want," she tells him, as she shoves a handful of old rags into his arms. He'll be able to make them into useable bandages, with some effort. She has a vision for the hovel he lives in. She looks at the crumbling wreckage and sees a beacon of hope. Anders struggles to see it, most of the time, but he's capable of standing by and letting her do what she wants. She prods him along as easily as she drags in new furniture. If she gives him food, he eats it. And if she tells him they need to find supplies to create a free clinic in the middle of Darktown, he'll follow her, and act like it's totally reasonable.

"Expensive?" he asks carefully.

"Of course. Everything is. But more than that. We'll need to go to the Gallows." Lirene is watching him, so she can read the panic in his eyes before he can stop it. It only takes a moment to recognize the way he's tensed up. He forces himself to relax. Lirene rests a hand on his forearm briefly. "Not inside," she reminds him. "Just the market in the courtyard. You don't have to go."

She nods toward a corner that Anders hadn't noticed was occupied, and he cringes at his own lack of awareness. He's more tired than he thinks. A mistake like that could've easily been fatal. Or maybe he just trusts Lirene to protect him. More than he should. More than is safe.

There's no threat lurking in the hidden shadows of her shop, just a boy. He sits on one of the battered crates, swinging his legs back and forth. "His name's Kai," Lirene tells Anders. "You met his older brother the other day."

Anders tries to remember when he'd met a young boy. And then he remembers the injured Haze addict. The younger boy has the same look about him: dark eyes, caramel skin. Rivaini, maybe. Anders wonders what they're doing here. "Do they have parents?" he asks softly.

"No," the boy - Kai - pipes up, and Anders flushes as he remembers how much he'd hated it when adults talked about him like he wasn't there.

"Sorry," Anders murmurs.

Kai shrugs. "I can get you whatever you want," he insists. "Even lyrium."

The thought makes Anders cringe, though he doesn't reveal his discomfort. He stifles the lecture inside him, just waiting to burst forth, that this child, who cannot be older than eight or nine, is far too young to be embroiled in such dangerous games. "He's not in the gangs already, is he?" Anders asks Lirene carefully. He's aware that his concern for the child might be misplaced and is certainly useless, especially according to Lirene's exceptionally pragmatic world view, but he still is not capable of erasing that concern.

"Kai's a courier," Lirene replies. "Unaffiliated, at least so far. His brother looks out for him."

"You mean when he's not so high that he can't even move," Anders spits.

Lirene whirls around, fire flashing in her brown eyes. "If you speak ill of the people here, I want you out," she demands. She sounds just as righteous and frightening as any of the Chantry's preachers, and Anders immediately feels guilty. And a whole lot less judgmental, which was probably the point. "What other options do you think exist for a child like Kai?" Lirene adds, more softly. "Or Hawk? Or  _you,_ for that matter? We're all criminals."

"I know," Anders replies simply. He'd long ago lost count of how many laws he's broken in his turbulent life. Every breath he takes simply prolongs the inevitable death sentence when it all catches up to him, and he damn well knows it. "I'm going to the Gallows," he insists. "The kid doesn't need to get caught for me."

Lirene nods, tossing him a few empty pouches. Anders stuffs them into the waistband of his trousers. The smallest bag has a few coins safely hidden inside, enough - he hopes - to pick up enough herbs and medicines to be able to make some kind of difference for the people who have already begun to seek him out, with Lirene's guidance. He starts thinking about which ingredients he'll want, how hard they might be to find, how much they'll cost. It gives him a goal to focus on, a simple one, but the shopping list will hopefully keep his attention from wandering too far and dwelling on the panic-inducing location. They'll go in the morning. That's a lot of time to wait, and worry.

"Do you want to sleep here, Anders?" Lirene asks. She has already offered her home to Kai, who is afraid to go home and face his troubled family. But that's the type of person she is. She'll offer everything she has to anyone who needs it. Anders shakes his head before she's finished asking. "You need to sleep," she demands. She won't take no for an answer. That's the type of person she is, too. Anders doesn't bother to protest, but he knows he couldn't sleep if he tried. Not now. His thoughts are racing too far and too fast, flitting away before he can grasp onto any of them. And he doesn't want to go to the Gallows. Every instinct in him is screaming that he should run.

Lirene places a steaming mug of tea into his free hand and pulls him out to sit on the couple of tilting stone steps in front of her home. She leaves the door open a crack, in case Kai needs her. But her focus now is on the adult who has been denied help and safety for so long that he no longer knows how to ask for it.

"You're exhausted," she points out. "How long has it been since you've slept?"

"Last night."

"For more than an hour?"

"Why do you care?!"

"Because you came here for a reason," Lirene replies steadily. She doesn't let go of Anders' hand, and doesn't let him break away. "Why did you come?"

"I dunno, I just... I don't really know anyone else. And I..."

"Didn't want to be alone," Lirene finishes softly.

"Yeah."

He sets his mug down on the stone underneath him, as Lirene hugs him close. Anders inhales a deep, shaky breath, but he doesn't want to let go of this. He reaches up, cautiously, and runs his fingers through Lirene's tangled dark hair. He can feel the warmth of her breath and her body. He lets it wash over him, all too aware of how long it's been since he's felt the touch of a woman. Or better yet, the companionship of a friend. He presses his lips gently to hers. She stiffens suddenly, and gasps. She does not push him away, but Anders feels the sting of rejection all the same. He pulls away, too quickly and too slowly all at once, and lets his hands rest awkwardly at his side.

"I'm sorry," he stammers out hastily. Panic overtakes him. Maker, how could he have been so  _stupid_? Was he really that desperate? He could go to the Blooming Rose to take care of those needs. There was no reason for him to come here, to involve Lirene, who has done nothing but help him, unconditionally. Maker, why can't he just  _think_ , sometimes? Would it kill him? "I'm  _really_  sorry," he repeats, desperately trying to repair the damage. "I shouldn't have..."

"Shut up," Lirene insists. Anders does. He prepares himself for a telling off, but when she speaks, her voice is soft. Barely audible. She reaches out and runs her fingers down his bare arm, leaving goosebumps in their wake. He shivers slightly, and reminds himself that whatever signals he'd thought he'd read, he was  _very wrong_. Lirene's other hand rests softly on his cheek. "It isn't you," she tells him softly.

Anders nods. He can already feel himself pulling away. He's heard this before. Hell, he's  _given_  this speech before, plenty of times.

Don't get attached. He should know better.

"I'll just go," he insists, jumping quickly to his feet.

"Don't," Lirene orders. Anders turns back, despite his better judgement. "Please don't," she murmurs. It is the most vulnerable he's ever seen her. He can't walk away. And she must know that.

He nods, and sits down again, awkwardly, perched on the narrow edge of the steps.

"I'm sorry," Lirene tells him, and he doesn't meet her eyes. What the hell does she have to be sorry for? "It's just..." she shakes her head.

Anders damn well recognizes what it looks like when someone doesn't want to talk about something. "It's okay," he tells her, honestly. "You don't have to explain."

Lirene runs her hand through her hair and breathes out, long and slow. She shakes her head. "No," she admits. "I don't. But I want to."

She pushes the mostly untouched mug of tea back into Anders' hand. He wraps his fingers around it, but still doesn't drink. "Okay," he prompts. When she still doesn't speak, he finds himself staring at her, uncertain what he's supposed to do. "Look, I'm not really an expert at this kind of thing."

"Listening?"

"Friendship."

Lirene nods, sipping her own tea. "I kinda know what you mean."

"You? I don't believe that. Everyone loves you."

"Only because they can get something from me."

"Oh," Anders whispers. He looks down at the table again.

"Not you, though," Lirene amends quickly. "You're not like that."

"I might be."

"I don't believe that," Lirene says again. She gulps down a large swallow of hot tea, steeling her nerves. "Look, I just want you to know... tonight... it's not that I don't like you. It's just..."

"There was someone else before," Anders fills in. "Right?"

Lirene nods. "My husband. And my children." She can barely force the words out, this admission of her loss, the emptiness she's been trying unsuccessfully to fill, for years. Forever.

"Did they... die in the Blight?" Anders asks gently. He has seen so much loss and death, it's  _inside him_ , that Taint. Lirene narrows her eyes, and he stops talking immediately. "Sorry," he mutters.

"You apologize a lot, you know?"

"Yeah. I guess I have a lot to apologize for."

"Like what?"

"I dunno. I've hurt a lot of people. Made a lot of promises I couldn't keep. You know?"

Lirene nods again, and sighs. Her face is twisted with pain; not physical, but recognizable all the same. Anders reaches out and gently runs his fingers down her jawline. The tension in her muscles relaxes slightly in response to his touch. Sparks of yellow-blue light glow, their static energy pulling at their hair.

"Are you doing magic on me?" Lirene accuses.

"Just a little," Anders admits, letting it snap out. "I wasn't really thinking. You were... hurting."

Lirene looks up, and smiles weakly. "Thank you, Anders."

"Yeah. Sure. No problem."

"Please don't go," Lirene repeats. Anders nods agreement.

They go back inside, and Kai has fallen asleep on the same cot where Anders had first encountered his brother. Lirene offers Anders her bed, but he shakes his head and instead lays down across several pushed together chairs, wrapped in a quilt that reminds him inexplicably of his mother. The smell and feel of it brings up memories he'd thought he'd lost a long time ago. They keep him awake. He keeps trying to make them clearer, but the more he tries, the more they seem to slip away.

He spends the night caught between sleep and waking, tossing and turning, trying and failing to make himself comfortable. Dawn is just beginning to creep when he opens his eyes again, unaware of when they had finally closed. The grey light slanting across the floorboards and through the cracks in the wall is still far too dim to see by.

Anders rolls over, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling, wrapped in the shadows and the darkness. His muscles feel stiff, and hunger gnaws at the inside of his stomach, enough to register as a noticeable pain as he slowly sits up. His throat feels dry, until he fumbles about for a nearly-empty waterskin hastily thrown onto a nearby shelf. He sips at the water, then stretches and stands. Even now, years away from the Tower, the early morning quiet unnerves him.

The room is empty now, except for him. Sometime during the night, Lirene had pulled closed the curtain that divides her sleeping space from the rest of the room, and Kai is gone. There's a hush to this time of day, when those lucky enough to have found work in the mines are already heading out to their labors, and those unlucky ones who've spent their nights desperately trying to drown their sorrows in the taverns and brothels are now sleeping off the attempt.

Anders pushes open the rickety door, letting air and light into the space. The breezes still carry with them the scent of the Darktown sewers, but he doesn't notice it as much anymore. Or at least, when he does notice, it's not so overwhelming. He still needs the air and the dim light, the awareness that he is not trapped. Now more than ever, he needs that reassurance.

He is sure that Lirene notices his twitchiness, on the edge of open panic, but she says nothing and draws no attention to it as they make their way through the Kirkwall streets. The Gallows courtyard is the largest open space in the city, but it manages to feel claustrophobic despite that. Or maybe  _because_ of it, Anders isn't sure. It's possible that the courtyard feels smaller because of the comparative immensity of the prison looming above it. The little bit of the island accessible to the public is swallowed completely by the shadow of the fortress. Where Hightown's market eventually dissolves into wide streets, and even the crammed together merchant stalls of Lowtown allow for quick exits into spiraling alleys and secret hideaways, the Gallows courtyard is walled off on three of its four sides by thick bars and heavy stone. The open space at is entrance leads only to dark water, and is patrolled by a full complement of templars.

Anders avoids them, but looking over his shoulder thankfully just makes him fit in with the nervous crowd, rather than stand out. He doesn't believe in the ghost stories that commoners and children tell, about haunted places that drive men mad. But just because it's more complicated than they think doesn't mean there not a grain of truth in the whispered tales. He can feel the thinness of the Veil here, fraying and tearing as the mages stuck inside work spells that only weaken that barrier further. It was like that at Kinloch Hold too, but Kinloch Hold wasn't built on blood. Or at least, not  _much_. Anders scowls up at the thousand-year-old statues that somehow still gleam golden, high above his head. Even if they weren't there, he's completely aware of the history of this place. He can't not be. The courtyard is as large as it is because it was built to be a killing field, the end of line for thousands of slaves, and the oppressive weight of that terror hasn't faded. Even people who can't touch the Fade can feel it. It's obvious in the way they move and talk, hunched and hidden, refusing to make eye contact. Those with weapons keep a hand on them, everyone watches each other with furtive, paranoid glances.

Lirene too, seems in a hurry to be done with this place. She doesn't stop to talk to people the way she does in the streets of Lowtown. It's Anders who takes it slow this time, not because he wants to, but because he feels as though he  _must_. There is something in this space that pulls at him, refusing to let him leave easily. He hears things that no one else seems to: warped echoes of children crying on the other side of the bars, angry voices yelling in a nonsensical mix of Kirkwall Common and Ancient Tevene that somehow makes perfect sense to him.

"You alright?" Lirene asks him softly.

"Yeah," he replies immediately, although he isn't. His skin feels too tight, like something is crawling inside him. His muscles burn with restless energy. The Tranquil that run most of the shops here make his stomach flip. He searches for Karl without trying to be too obvious about it, and he isn't sure whether or not it's a good thing that he doesn't see his friend. Worry and disappointment mix into the already overwhelming dark nature of this place, so Anders finishes his transactions with brusque efficiency. He secrets away a good stockpile of herbs. There are more complicated mixes that he can't make on his own, but they are not for sale - at least not in the daylight hours, even if he had the coin.

Lirene sticks close to him on the long walk back to Darktown, reluctant to leave him even when they reach the narrow crossroads where they will have to split up, for her to go home and Anders to go... somewhere. He sticks around, long enough to watch her disappear into the twisting streets. He's not worried about her safety. He just doesn't particularly want to be alone. Even still. He got what he wanted from the trip she dragged him into, and he successfully evaded templar attention while doing it. That should make it easier to breathe. But fear still clings to him, and restless energy still drives him.

His cramped hovel feels even more dark and lonely when held up against the burning, permanent  _aliveness_  of a place like the Gallows, which is intensely painful, but real in a way that the dullness of day-to-day existence can never hope to be. Mana exists everywhere, but it seems harder to find down here, where he is the only one capable of grabbing onto it, and he does so only when he has to, when it's worth the risk. It seems slippery now, and far away, a flicker that gets harder to catch each time he tries. He wonders about the mage girl hiding in the alienage, if she feels the emptiness and lack as strongly as he does. He longs to speak to her again, to find out more about her. But he can hardly blame her for wanting to hide, or for needing to keep secrets.

He tells himself, over and over, that it's a relief to be away from the Gallows. He says the words aloud, under his breath, as he flexes freezing fingers and watches the air escape his lungs and puff out into the winter cold. Down here there is no sky, but at least that means that the prison island is out of sight. Not out of mind, though. Never.

He tells himself that loneliness is a price worth paying, if it is the cost of freedom. Those muddled thoughts chase him forward, as he moves as quickly as he can toward the welcoming warmth of The Hanged Man.

The tavern is as shadowy and shabby as the rest of Lowtown, full of dust and mold and the smells of far too many people who've gone too long without bathing, yet Anders finds it mostly comfortable. He does not drop his guard, not entirely - he never does. But he relaxes enough to fill his belly with fish stew and watery ale. He's always liked these kinds of places; the dark holes where respectable people like the templars never go, where he is surrounded by serving women with rounded breasts and ready smiles, and men who are gruff and usually drunk, but at least honest about the threat they pose.

A dwarf with a crossbow hovers around at a table in the corner, and Anders raises an eyebrow in surprise. Aside from the few he'd run with in the Wardens, seeing a dwarf on the surface is obviously a rare occasion. It's rarer still to see one so obviously at home in a human tavern. The barmaid who hands him his clay mug smiles at the look on his face. "Just don't wander over there, 'less you're lookin' to have your ear talked off," she teases. Anders nods, sips his ale, and thanks her for the warning.

With food in his belly, he feels a bit better. His thoughts are clearer, at least. He leaves behind a few copper coins - more than he ought to part with - for the serving woman, and huddles under his coat to once more brave the winter chill. He still cannot find the courage to return to his Darktown home. The rapidly setting sun will soon force him to, but for now he turns instead to the twisting streets that form Lowtown's haphazard markets. The sellers shout loudly enough to be heard over the wind, but they seem to be shouting mostly to themselves. A woman or a boy here or there will exchange a coin or two for a few wilting vegetables or a handful of salt, but there is little enough business, and even less cheer. Kirkwall is overcrowded to the point of breaking, and it takes everything the people have only to survive.

It still feels better being out here among them than being alone.


	5. Overloaded

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is something inside him, a frenetic energy responding to the overload.

By the time Anders makes it back to Darktown, in the deep middle of the night, he is too tired to think much anymore. There is nothing else left that can distract him, and he can only pray that he'll be able to fall asleep this time, if he tries. But he isn't alone. Lantern light glows in his window, and the door to his home is unlocked, and slightly open still.

Anders takes a deep breath and gathers enough mana to defend himself if he needs to before he steps into the still-darkened room and kicks the few damp flurries of snow from his boots. He knows he should be surprised to find the Hawk waiting for him, but, somehow, he isn't. She still wears those knives, strapped to her armor, but she doesn't pull one out. Her mana touches his, and stirs it up, filling him with a new and sudden wakefulness. It's enough, anyway, to attempt to make sense of the fact that she isn't alone either. This isn't a social call. It's obvious in the anger and fear that propel her actions.

"He needs help," Hawk demands. Anders frowns. Somehow she has managed to drag along a barely-conscious elf. His muscular, color-streaked bare chest is pale and soaked with sweat. He clearly much stronger than she is, and as he struggles to remain sitting upright on a crate shoved into the corner, he curses weakly in a language that Anders does not immediately recognize. Hawk snaps at him to shut up. Surprisingly, the elf complies. Anger still flares in his narrowed eyes, and his suspicious scowl travels freely from the mercenary mage to the healer standing, confused, in the doorway.

Sticky blood sticks to the elf's shockingly white hair, and his eyes, when he looks up enough for Anders to see them, are clouded and dazed.

"What happened?" Anders asks softly.

"I don't know," Hawk replies.

Anders' frown deepens.

He points the elf to a falling-apart cot hastily shoved into a corner. The fighter scowls at him, but sits. The cot sags under his weight, but the elf seems not to notice.

Anders sits across from him, and reaches out to trail his hand over his arm. The tattoos inked into the elf's skin seem to glow a brighter blue as soon as Anders gets close enough to touch. The elf yanks his arm away, and backs up as far as he can, slamming his back up against the nearby wall. He watches Anders with wild, suspicious eyes.

"He won't let you heal him," Hawk murmurs.

"Then why in the Void did you bring him here?" Anders snaps. There is something inside him, a frenetic energy responding to the overload of power in the room. He can feel the three of them, each with their own form and flavor of magic, standing alone but mixing together, pushing the mana inside of him to strain for release. His own power feels the weakest of them all. He flexes his fingers; open and shut. And he watches the girl, Hawk. His eyes don't leave hers, as he searches for some hint of truth, some  _reason_.

"I don't know," she repeats. She looks between the two men, looking lost and overshadowed, caught between them.

"We need a place to lie low for a while," the elf growls.

He holds Anders' attention, distracting him from the girl. But Anders can still  _feel_ her presence, hovering just out of reach. His skin feels itchy and too small. He squeezes his eyes shut, and wills his headache to go away. With one hand, he fumbles around on the nearby shelf for the potion that will keep him awake enough to make sense of this.

"I am perfectly capable of healing by the normal methods," the elf assures him. "I have suffered from far worse wounds than this."

Anders nods absently. He hasn't been in Kirkwall long, but it's not the first time by far that he's dealt with people who are too proud to let a mage erase their injuries for them. Maybe Anders even counts as one of those people. He supposes it depends on who you ask.

"He hates mages," Hawk points out. Anders groans, and turns to look at her. She's sitting on top of a makeshift table, looking exhausted enough that he's afraid she might fall. Anders figures the elf wasn't the only one involved in a fight tonight.

"And, I say again, you brought him  _here_."

"He hasn't killed me yet," the girl admits. She doesn't look at him. "I think he... kind of owes me."

"He works for Athenril, does he?"

"I don't work for anyone," the elf snarls.

Hawk shrugs. "Tonight wasn't about Athenril," she concedes, which sounds like a hedge if Anders ever heard one.

"He says he doesn't need a healer," Anders points out.

"Yeah, but-"

"Hawk," Fenris pleads. "I just need... I just need... sleep." His words are slurring. Anders studies the girl, attempting to gauge her reaction. Somehow he knows that paying attention to  _her_ is the important thing, that it will tell him what he needs to know, that it will matter more than watching the elf.

She can tell he's watching her, obviously. Her eyes flicker up to meet his briefly, and they are clouded with the same worry and fear that he'd recognized earlier. Anders turns away from her, briefly. He studies his small collection of potions and healing agents, and his hand closes around a small glass bottle. He tosses it to the elf, who scowls down at it. Anders watches the mercenary's lip curl. "It'll help you sleep," Anders says simply. "Take it or don't, I don't care."

The elf pockets the medicine - to keep or to sell, Anders has no idea. And then he curls up on the pallet. His eyes close, but he sleeps lightly, guardedly. Anders isn't surprised.

He turns back to Hawk. The girl tucks her hair behind her ear and watches as the elf relaxes into peaceful sleep. He sits down next to her - the tabletop isn't large, and by joining her on it, he puts them so close to each other that he can feel the shallow rise and fall of her breathing. His long hair brushes against her bare skin, making her squirm.

"Did you mean it," she asks softly. "About talking to you about mage stuff?"

"About  _anything_ ," Anders reminds her.

"Yeah," she repeats. "About anything."

He nods. "Yes. I meant it." They both watch the elf for a long, almost-silent moment. "Did you know about those tattoos?" Anders asks. "That they're made of lyrium?"

The girl's eyes wrinkle in confusion. She shakes her head. "No," she admits. "Why would I?"

"You can't feel it?" She shrugs. "It turns him into a... conduit. Any magic that touches him, even a benign spell... it would be agonizing." He sighs, running his fingers through his hair, hastily pulling it back into a ponytail. It won't make him look any less sleep-deprived, but he wonders if it at least might make him slightly presentable. "This shouldn't even be.. possible. He shouldn't be alive."

"But he is."

"Obviously. Maybe not for much longer though."

"What're you talking about?"

"Lyrium's a  _poison_. You know that."

"Lots of people use lyrium and don't die."

"Well, no. Not right away. But to have it  _inked into your blood_..."

"You can't help him, though? He's still gonna die?" Her voice shakes, just a little, as she asks. Anders takes her hand without thinking, and he is instantly aware that unlike their other brief interactions, this time, she doesn't pull away.

"I don't know," Anders says carefully. "He's not  _hurt_ , in the traditional sense. He's not sick. I don't know..." He sighs, watching her chew on her lower lip. She doesn't meet his eyes. "Hawk, why'd you come here?"

"Because you told me to."

Well, he can't exactly argue with that. But this is over his head. He watches the elf, who barely moves, even in his sleep. "Who is he?" he asks softly.

Hawk shrugs. "No one." Anders raises an eyebrow. He doesn't believe that for one second. "He's called Fenris. He used to be a slave."

"But -"

"In Tevinter. But he lived here sometimes too. A lot of the time. His master owned this mansion in Hightown. I guess he was a merchant, or like a... diplomat. Or something."

"A magister," Anders fills in. His lip curls in hatred, mixed with fear. He feels like he can barely breathe as he attempts to sort through the implications of all this. His stomach constricts. He'd heard stories of the Tevinter mages growing up, of course he had. But he'd figured most of those stories were corrupted by Chantry propaganda and bored kids. "There's magic in him," Anders breathes. He can feel it, if he tries, the same way he can feel the mana flowing through the girl sitting next to him. "Using his body itself as a source of mana. Literally feeding off of him to fuel unnatural power."

"Yeah," Hawke breathes. "I've seen him kill people just by touching them. He can make them bleed without any weapons."

She's scared of him, Anders can hear it in her voice. He can't blame her. What she's describing is the worst, most evil kind of blood magic. "Why haven't the templars caught up with him?"

"He's not a mage."

Anders snorts. He might as well be. It scares him to think what the Chantry might do if they got their hands on this living Tevinter experiment. "I don't think that really matters," he manages to say, evenly.

Hawk only shrugs. "So he's not gonna die, right?" she finally says. Her eyes flicker between the two men, looking for reassurance, some sense of safety to counteract her fear.

"I don't... think so," Anders repeats. He wonders why he can't just give her the 'yes' she so clearly wants to hear. But he doesn't want to make promises he can't keep anymore. And, for some inexplicable reason, the things he says to this girl feel like they matter.

"Good," Hawk confirms. She nods. Her grip on the tabletop tightens just a bit. She watches as Anders pushes himself to his feet and begins to rummage around for something they can eat. He starts a pot of tea, and then he turns back to the other mage.

"What about you?" he asks gently, as he brings her some bread and cheese. "Are you hurt?"

She shakes her head, but Anders doesn't believe her. She is exhausted, bruised, covered in blood. It's the second time in a week that she's been here. She's talking this time, but she only looks more shaken and vulnerable.

"Have you ever killed anyone?" she asks. She holds the few scraps of hard bread he'd handed her tightly in her hand, but doesn't eat. Anders raises an eyebrow, and he sits down next to her. She shifts slightly, as far as she can in the small space. But she watches him, intently focused on his response.

"Yes," he tells her, very softly.

The girl does not visibly react at all. Her muscles are tense, but that's not new. Anders can feel the mana stirring inside her. He rests his hand on her shoulder. The heat of her skin radiates through the threadbare fabric of her shirt; it seems to jump from her to him. "Have you?" he asks, even more quietly.

She nods. "Lots of people," she insists, and although the statement is true, it is also full of bravado. Anders notices the way she holds her breath, the way her fingers of her free hand curl up into a fist after she stuffs a large chunk of bread into her mouth. She wipes her arm across her face, and stares at the elf still sleeping a few footsteps away. Fenris barely moves, as though afraid to let himself fully relax even in slumber. Anders has to watch for a long time before he sees evidence of breath in the rise and fall of the slender elf's ribs.

He rubs his own eyes and lifts his cup of tea to his lips, letting the steam coming from the mug warm him even before he takes a drink. He wonders what it would be like to be able to sleep so calmly. He gulps the tea, nearly choking against the heat, and scratches his messy hair, barely stifling a yawn. His head is swimming. He grabs another of the potions that will keep him awake, and pockets it, promising himself that he won't take it yet. Only if he needs it.

The girl - Hawk - doesn't even seem to notice. She slips down from the table so that she is standing. She spins around, so that she is looking at him once again. With Anders slouching atop the table, they are now almost eye-to-eye. "I slid my knife across a man's throat an hour ago," she snarls. Her voice is full of righteous, fiery anger. It seems out of place coming from someone so young and small, though Anders knows damn well that underestimating someone like her could easily get him killed.

"That I believe," he tells her, honestly. "But I don't believe you...  _want_ to kill."

He can't explain why he feels this with such certainty. Maybe it's the shock of connection that buzzes through him every time he's in close proximity to her. Maybe it's the way her mana feels: clear, and bright, untainted by the darkness that tends to creep in after someone has dealt too long with pain and death and despair. Maybe it's just that he has always been adept at reading people, a skill that only grew more critical over the years, with his very survival riding on it. He doesn't trust anyone, not all the way, but he believes that this girl - like Lirene - is worthy of being trusted.

"Only the ones who deserve it," Hawk concedes. Her voice is quiet, but serious. There is a hardness in it that Anders recognizes all too well. He squeezes his eyes shut, and blows out a long breath. It's true he's only guessing at this girl's age - sixteen summers, he figures; maybe a little more - but he knows that is certainly old enough to understand desperation and survival.

"You killed someone tonight," he repeats. The mercenary mage holds his gaze but says nothing. She does not even nod. But Anders can read the confirmation in her eyes, if such a thing is even necessary, and he is not entirely sure that it is. "You did it for him," he adds, nodding at the sleeping elf.

"Yeah. I guess, I mean... I don't know. Maybe."

Anders takes another sip of tea to cover his smirk. "That would about cover all the options, yes."

"He asked for help," Hawk whispers quietly.

"To  _kill_ somebody."

"Danarius."

"The magister?" The girl nods. "You killed a  _Tevinter_   _magister_. By yourself?"

Hawk shrugs. "Yeah, I guess. It wasn't that hard." At least some of the lie is betrayed when she lifts her hand to the back of her head, wincing at the tenderness of the bruises left there. She hasn't bothered to heal herself, not yet. "He wasn't really paying that much attention to me. He wanted Fenris."

"Still." A mixture of awe and worry swirl up and fill Anders. He isn't sure  _he_ could take down a magister, he isn't sure he'd want to. And she's acting like it's nothing.

"Danarius barely touched Fenris, and he... I thought he was dead. I think..." she stops for a long moment, and holds the healer's gaze. And then she shakes her head. "I think he thought he was gonna die," she whispers. She tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "He told me that there was this... unbreakable connection. That Danarius could always find him."

Anders nods. He knows the theory behind such a spell - every Circle mage with a phylactery is familiar with it. Fenris just carries the phylactery inside him, bonded to just one man - the reason such a spell isn't much use to the Circle, without a physical vessel that any templar can use. "May've been that once upon a time, Danarius dying would've killed a bonded slave. But blood magic is just like any magic, I guess. Fades over time."

Hawk studies him, a dull non-comprehension glazing over her already-tired features. But she locks onto the words she does understand. "So he really is... free, then," she presses.

Anders shrugs. "Much as anybody. You really do care about him, don't you?"

She shakes her head, and Anders may be imagining it, but he could swear she blushes just a little bit. "No way," she spits out. "Absolutely not."

"If you say so."

"He hates me," she demands.

"Do you hate him?"

"I don't even know him. He just... needed help. Okay. That's  _all_."

"Okay," Anders concedes. It may even be true. People like him and Hawk, and probably Fenris, don't tend to get attached. They just survive.

"You know," he says softly, as he finishes the last of his breakfast. "I knew a few elves, in the Circle. Most of 'em were grateful to have some escape from the life the alienage would've forced on them."

"I guess that makes sense," the girl replies.

"But you seek out that life?"

"I guess?"

"It's not really a choice, is it?" She shakes her head, and Anders nods. He understands. The more he finds out about her, the more he wants to learn. But he won't push it. "Get some sleep," he tells her. "You can stay here as long as you need to."

Hawk drains the last of the tea from her mug, and shakes her head. "I can't," she tells him flatly. She shakes Fenris awake, and the elf doesn't protest. He'd been right about needing to lie low in case any of Danarius' hunters caught his scent in the aftermath of the magister's death. But he'd have to be truly desperate to hide under a mage's skirts, and after snatching even a few minutes of rest, he is no longer that desperate.

Anders watches them go. It only takes a few moments before the cold dark fog blowing in off the docks shrouds them quickly. He sits down on the newly-vacated cot and eventually drifts into a restless, broken sleep; the best he can manage, anymore.


	6. Fearless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If it weren't for me, girl, you'd be dead or in the Gallows. You've been growing bold of late."
> 
> "I thought that's why you liked me."
> 
> "Your fearlessness has a certain value," Athenril concedes. "Still, I'd hate to see you get hurt."

 

 

Hawk practically runs after Fenris, grateful for the bracing power of the frigid night air. The elf doesn't want her help, that much is obvious. He'd pushed her away almost before they'd even left the clinic. But she's fine with that. She knows Fenris hates her and the consistency of their mutual suspicion for one another is almost refreshing after the hell of a night she's had. It's the healer that throws her off. He seems to see right through her, and it's both frightening and infuriating. She'll be grateful to get back to the familiar territory of the alienage, where almost everyone will ignore her and she can figure out her next move.

She keeps watching the elven fighter as they walk, but it's more out of curiosity now than concern. She thinks about what the healer said: Fenris shouldn't be alive. He might be dying. She wonders, idly, if Athenril knows or cares. Hawk doesn't pity Fenris - he's never helped her, and she can't really summon up a good reason why she'd bothered helping him tonight.

"I did what you wanted," she insists.

Fenris smirks at her. "Do you want payment now, Hawk?"

"I didn't do this for free."

"You could've stolen any of Danarius' many treasures from the estate. You didn't."

Hawk glares at him, annoyed at how easily he reads her. Fenris doesn't even seem to notice her discomfort though. He keeps walking, looking for all the world like nothing had happened. No one would know that he'd nearly died a few hours earlier, after walking into a trap of his own making. "I did all the work," Hawk snaps. You were just the bait!"

Fenris whirls on her, angry fire flashing in his eyes. "Do you think you're the first mage I've ever asked for help against Danarius?" He stalks toward her, ripping his sword out of the sheath strapped across his back. The lyrium lines all over his body glow from within. "You have  _no idea_  what that man did to me! There is  _nothing_  easy about confronting him!"

"I killed him!" Hawk screams back. She takes a step backward, out of the reach of his weapon. But she  _isn't_ afraid. "All  _you_ did was cower in a corner."

Fenris watches her, growling and pacing smoothly, exactly like the wolf that is his namesake. "He wanted  _me_ ," he reminds the human apostate. "You were nothing more than an insect to him. Beneath notice."

Hawk calls fire to her hand, letting it flicker and grow, sparks flying between her fingers and growing slowly until they coalesce into a small ball. She does it without thinking. It feels so desperately, dangerously good to be in command of something. "I'm not afraid of him," she demands. "Or you."

Fenris stares at the fireball in her hand, and shakes his head, before spitting onto the ground at her feet. "You're nothing more than a  _child_."

"My child, Fenris. Leave her alone." Hawk's head snaps up as soon as she hears Athenril's voice. She lets the fire snap out as the elven woman approaches. "And if you want to hire her to take care of something for you, you ask me first, understand? And I want hazard pay."

"You don't own me," Hawk insists.

Athenril shakes her head, laughing at the young apostate's bravado. "If it weren't for me, girl, you'd be dead or in the Gallows. You've been growing bold of late."

"I thought that's why you liked me."

"Your fearlessness has a certain value," Athenril concedes. "Still, I'd hate to see you get hurt."

The threat contained within the words is obvious, and Hawk grits her teeth, pulling away from Athenril's casual touch. She looks to Fenris, although she knows better than to anticipate that the mercenary will step in or say anything in her defense. He hates her the same way he hates all mages, and enjoys watching her suffer. He's never pretended otherwise.

"Come inside," Athenril demands. "There's work to be done."

Hawk follows her into the dimly lit main room that takes up most of the first floor of the alienage hideout. There are half-opened crates scattered about, and ledgers and shipping manifests litter the floor of the room. Hawk glances into the nearest box, but it's empty except for some broken fragments of pottery and a bed of straw that has obviously been pawed through.

She can feel Athenril staring at her. The gang leader is dangerously angry. It might be difficult for someone else to tell, but Hawk has been the elf woman's closest confidante for years, and she's trained herself to be intensely aware of Athenril's shifting moods.

"What happened?" she asks cautiously. It's a risk even drawing attention to herself when Athenril is in this state, but if she can help fix the problem, that in itself may serve as a useful enough distraction.

Athenril glares at her, standing completely still. Her narrow fingers are clenched into tight fists and Hawk doesn't envy whoever the target of the gang leader's rage is. The mageling finds herself wondering if she'll be sent to settle the score. Someone disrupted their latest shipment, obviously. Sold them out for a better score, maybe? Or was it some Coterie rival grasping for something that wasn't theirs to take?

"There's an upstart new Guard, angling for promotion," Athenril spits. "Some refugee woman who doesn't understand her place in this town."

Hawk nods her understanding. She quickly scans the paperwork Athenril had thrown around the room in her initial tantrum, and recognizes immediately that the cargo which had been looted and most probably destroyed by the overzealous lawkeeper had come from Tevinter. That makes it rare, which makes it incredibly expensive. Most smugglers who aren't Carta won't touch the Imperium. Getting anything out of Minrathous, or even the smaller ports, takes months of setup and huge financial risks in the form of bribes and hush money. No wonder Athenril wants someone dead.

"I'll handle it," she promises, and Athenril's predatory smile sends a chill down Hawk's spine. She knows if she fucks this up, if Athenril isn't satisfied, she'll be the one the elf takes it out on. Better not fuck it up, then. She is still tired, hasn't slept for days, and Athenril no doubt knows that, but this isn't the kind of problem you can push off to some unspecific future.

She gives her employer one last cautious glance and then gets to work. It'll be the second time in a day that she's been forced to go to Hightown, a section of the city she usually successfully avoids for weeks, if not months. But unlike Fenris' attempt to slip into his former master's mansion without anyone noticing, this job will  _require_ being noticed. By the right person anyway. She'll walk in through the front door. That should get their attention. With knives strapped within easy reach and blood still on her armor, she is making absolutely no effort to hide.

The Guard barracks are nestled between the Chantry and the Viscount's sprawling estate, and the small building is easily overshadowed by both. The place is built entirely for function rather than form, with a couple of sparse offices, some of which have been subdivided into cells. Those are currently empty, Hawk notes.

As soon as she crosses the threshold, a boy steps forward, looking like a child playing dress-up in the uniform he wears. His mouth hangs open slightly as he stares at her. Hawk rolls her eyes and pretends like he isn't even there.

"Captain!" the boy calls. "Guard-Captain!"

As he goes running off down the hall, Hawk notices some very familiar seals on a few unopened crates stacked near a closed office door. She reaches out instinctively, ready to get back as much of Athenril's ill-begotten gains as she can manage. It isn't the reason for her being here, but it definitely won't hurt her cause any. There aren't nearly enough of the crates left to recoup her employer's losses, but the fact that there are any left at all means they're the most valuable and dangerous magic items and irreplaceable treasures that can't be found anywhere else. At least the Guard's predictable. They wouldn't destroy something they could use for their own gain. And if they can steal it, that means Hawk can steal it back.

Of course, the minute she makes a move, the door to the office opens, revealing a woman in Guard armor, with harsh features and tightly braided red hair.

Callin flashes the smile that she's been told makes her look young and innocent, and shifts position so that it hopefully won't be obvious what she was attempting to do. "Your mascot ran away," she points out.

The Guard rolls her eyes, looking irritated. "His loss," she points out. "The Captain he's running to ask for help is probably at the Blooming Rose, and so drunk that he won't even remember the pleasures he's spending the city's coin to indulge in. Is there something I can help you with?" Her accent is Fereldan.  _That_ surprises Hawk, even more so when compared with her especially blunt report on her superior officer's whereabouts. The apostate has lived in this city long enough to know that no one just hands out jobs to refugees.  _Especially_ in Hightown, where speaking openly about others' indiscretions is much more likely to result in permanent exile. "They didn't hand the job to me, I earned it," the woman insists, when Hawk points that out.

"Well, I guess we all can't be as lucky as you." She glances at the crates again, not caring anymore whether or not this woman knows what she's after. "Those are  _mine_."

"So you've come here to get back your stolen goods, is that it? You must take me for a fool."

"You're trying to do the right thing for Fereldans in this city, aren't you?" Hawk is keenly aware that they are both being watched, and a quick sideways glance catches most of the Guards' young recruits piling up in the hallway to observe what they are no doubt hoping will be an imminent confrontation. Hawk flashes a grin and waves at them, stirring up a predictable hubbub. The Fereldan guard narrows her eyes.

"And how exactly does allowing dangerous substances to proliferate for sale on the street do the right thing for anyone?" she asks. Her voice has dropped in pitch and gotten quiet, an overly obvious attempt to be intimidating. Hawk ignores the bait. She keeps most of her attention focused on the crates of stolen goods rather than focusing on the guard, who is only an obstacle between her and what she wants.

"You're drawing attention," she points out. "The wrong kind."

"Ah. So this is the part where I'm supposed to be afraid of you."

"Not me. I just came to talk. But there are others who wouldn't waste the time."

"So you've come to give me a warning?"

"I've come to give you an offer. An alliance."

"What makes you think I'd join forces with you?" the woman says, in a clipped, business-like tone. "You're nothing but a common thief. A petty criminal and an apostate. I could send you to the Gallows."

Hawk shakes her head, ignoring the threat before it's even out of the guard's mouth. Athenril says the same thing several times a day. If either one of them had any real plans to turn her over to the templars, they would have done it by now. "If you hand me over to Meredith, you're giving her control. You know that, right? You won't do it." The guard glares at her, but does not dispute the argument. Hawk pushes her diplomatic advantage. "I'm not asking you to ignore smuggling completely. Just work with us. The Coterie's your bigger threat anyway, and I can help you against them."

"You're asking me to help set up a power vacuum that may lead to a destabilizing gang war in this city,  _and_ let a criminal apostate run free."

"Both of those things are already happening. They'll happen no matter what you do. Sure, you could have me executed, or the Chantry could, but then you get nothing except maybe a pat on the back and a meaningless 'thank you.' If you really want to change anything in this city, you have to work with the people who live here."

A half-smile appears on the guard's lips, and she shakes her head in disbelief. "Under different circumstances, I'd say you'd do well in politics, Hawk."

"So you'll do it then."

"Don't take advantage."

Hawk nods, then glances, once more, at the crates the guard hovers over protectively. "Don't even think about it. Those are… I don't even know  _what_ they are. Dangerous artifacts from Tevinter. They go to the Circle, where they can be kept safely."

Hawk  _almost_ protests. But she can't afford to lose the dubious alliance she's just gained. It isn't sure protection, and she knows that. But having someone as highly placed as a lieutenant in the City Guard who cares about what happens to her might be a second shield against the danger of Kirkwall's overzealous Knight Commander. And she'll take any advantage she can get, insurance against the day when her usefulness to Athenril isn't enough to buy her freedom anymore.

She's exhausted, but habit sends her to the Hanged Man to kill the rest of the night's hours. She tucks herself into a corner and relaxes, not quite letting herself fall asleep, but close. She maintains a total awareness of her surroundings, even when her eyes are closed. In many ways, she feels safer here than she ever does in the alienage. The tavern is neutral ground, and it may be the closest thing she has to a family. The people here have known her since she was a child, and they look out for her.

"Hawk!" shouts a friendly voice. She's alert and on her feet immediately, tracking the sound across the room toward the large table where Varric holds court. The dwarven storyteller waves her over, a huge grin on his face. It's easy to join him knowing that all she has to do is listen to his winding overexaggerated tales and shrug off his questions and he'll likely buy her a full meal. The exchange looks promising already, as he slides a plate across the table to her before she's even sat down.

"What do you want?" she asks suspiciously, already pulling out a knife to cut the meat on her plate… is this really  _steak_? She shoves a large chunk of it into her mouth before the dwarf can change his mind about giving it to her. Varric chuckles.

"Are you always this suspicious, Little Hawk?"

"It's kept me alive so far."

"Well, I can't argue that."

"What do you want?" Callin repeats, the words muffled by her chewing.

"I'm having a little trouble with the Coterie."

"So?"

"So I'm asking for your help to keep them out of my interests."

"This isn't my problem."

"You fight Coterie all the time, it's not even like you'd be going out of your way."

"Yeah well, contrary to what seems to be  _everyone's_ opinion, I'm not exactly eager to get myself killed!"

"I don't think we have much of a choice, do you? This city's a shithole. Wouldn't you rather go down fighting?" Varric smirks as he sees the wheels turning in her head. " 'Preciate the help, Hawk."

"I didn't say I'd help you," she scowls.

"I know. But you will."

She pushes away the plate, no longer hungry. She is so fucking sick of everyone assuming they can use her. "If I do this," she insists. "I want something from you."

_That_ gets the dwarf's attention. He's still smiling, but it's obvious he's not taking her demands as a joke. He gives her a slight nod, and waves his hand, an invitation to continue speaking.

When he tells her he'll give her anything she asks, she almost believes him.

By the time Hawk makes it back to Athenril's hideout in the alienage, the sun is beginning to rise. Fenris sits in the corner of the cluttered front room, eyes on the door. He's cleaning his sword, and his lyrium tattoos give off a gentle blue glow in the darkness. "Where've you been?" he asks, as casually as he ever asks anything, which means that the words are laced with threat.

"None of your business," Callin mutters.

Fenris says nothing, but he flashes her a grin. "Athenril's been looking for you."

No doubt. Callin squares her shoulders and heads into the elven criminal's private quarters, figuring it's better just to confront things head on rather than wait for the woman to come to her. So what if she's angry? She's been angry before, and Callin's survived.

But Athenril isn't angry at all. Losing money and trade goods is part of the cost of doing business. Setting up alliances, moving pieces on the board, that's the truly valuable stuff, and in that, Hawk behaved exactly as instructed. "It's the street game," Athenril smirks. "Guard wants information from down below, give 'em information. But you pick what they hear. You got it?"

Hawk nods. Athenril smiles. "That's my girl."

She runs her fingers along the girl's shoulderblades and leans in, to whisper in her ear. Hawk can smell the scent of her perfume, something made from flowers that grow out on the mountain; some elvish thing. "I have missed you,  _da'mi_." Little blade. Athenril's the only one who calls her that.

She squirms. But something kindles in her belly all the same. "You're not mad at me?" she asks cautiously. Athenril laughs, and pulls the human girl close. Her lips brush across Callin's, and her fingers dance across the mage's skin. "I'm not mad at you," the smuggler confirms.


	7. Haunted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders wanders among them all, without apparent purpose.

In the Lowtown streets, familiar packs of children roam, huddled under cloaks and coats and hiding under the threadbare canopies above the market stalls, or else tucked into the narrow gaps beside the steps leading to the poorer houses of the neighborhood. They speak in hushed whispers when they speak at all; more often, Anders spies them stealthily sliding their fingers into the pockets of unsuspecting passerby. A fair number of the City Guard patrol these streets, but these small and skinny children evade them with the practiced skill born of experience. The merchants guard their own wares far more closely than the Guard, and all but the most daring street thieves stay clear of them.

Anders wanders among them all, without apparent purpose. Old pinpricks of fear crawl up his spine, an impossible-to-shake sense of being watched. He tells himself he has no reason to be frightened. He is smart enough not to flamboyantly throw around magic in public places. The people who surround him like fish in a stream have no reason to suspect him as anything other than someone like them, one of the masses of nameless struggling poor. Yes, there are many now in this city who know the truth of what he is, but none have turned him over to the Gallows.

It's been long enough now that the refugees of Ferelden have, for the most part, assimilated into the community of the destitute and desperate within Darktown. Anders has been living among them for nearly two years, and the clinic he runs has saved enough lives that he has gained countless allies, willing to warn him of impending templar sweeps if not lie outright to protect him.

One of those allies, the young boy, Kai, catches Anders' eye from across the narrow alley. He smiles, and his teeth shine white in the evening shadows. Anders smiles back, unable to stop himself. Without thinking, he turns to a nearby seller and pays for a fragment of rock sugar. He slips it into the boy's hand. The kid tucks it into his pocket, no doubt thinking himself too old to be so easily bribed. Anders only shrugs, and sits down next to him. It's then that he notices the vials in the boy's hand; two of them, with small blue-white crystals barely visible through their shields of waxed paper.

Anders wraps his arms tightly around the boy's shoulder. He brushes the tangled mat of hair out of the child's eyes. "What do you think you're doing?" he growls.

The force of his own anger startles him, but Kai doesn't even blink. He shrugs Anders off and glares at him, with his fingers clenched into tight fists. Anders takes the scraps of street-processed lyrium from the boy and stuffs them into his pocket. He imagines he can feel something of the mineral's unnatural pull even through the smooth, thick glass. "This stuff is  _dangerous,_ " he insists. More dangerous, maybe, than anyone here can know. Corrupted and mixed with Maker-knows-what, as though the raw detritus of magic on the physical plane weren't dangerous enough all on its own.

Kai scowls. "Do you think you're some kind of savior?" the boy mutters. "We don't need that down here. We've got the Chantry for that kind of thing."

At the mention of the Chantry, Anders almost loses control completely. He takes a long, careful breath through his nose, and forces himself to  _look_ at the boy. Just a child, doing the same as everyone around him. A child left all on his own.

"I'm nobody's savior," Anders snaps."Do what you want."

He isn't surprised in the slightest when Kai trots along behind him. Within moments, he's running ahead - toward Lirene's shop. Anders crosses the threshold just after the boy. He lays the vials of Haze onto the Fereldan woman's counter. She frowns when she sees them, and quickly hides them away, but says nothing.

Kai crumples beneath her gaze. He sits down on the edge of the bench, already occupied by a woman working at a quilt. Standing nearby is a cluster of men, able-bodied, but unable to find work all the same. Kai looks up, silently pleading with Lirene. Anders can feel the quiet anger radiating from the boy. His brother's been gone more often than not, disappearing into the streets or the mines he's too young to die in. He comes  _back_ , but it's no wonder Kai is feeling abandoned anyway, clinging to Anders and Lirene in an attempt to fill the gap.

"Might snow," Lirene comments, glancing quickly at the vials of lyrium and obviously pretending not to see them. Kai frowns at her, and shakes his head. "It snows sometimes, boy," she tells him.

Not more than a slight dusting, that Anders has ever seen. He looks out through Lirene's still cracked-open door, which rattles and slams as the cold wind buffets it. Only a bare sliver of moon is visible in the sky, and even that is soon swallowed by thick clouds.

Anders remembers the days when it snowed at the Tower, and he climbed up to the top of the library shelves to press himself against the window to stare as the blizzard winds whirled thick white flakes into the air. In those quiet winter mornings, the lake around Kinloch Hold would freeze, and blankets of snow half as tall as he was would pile up against the thick walls of the tower. The snow would stay, unspoiled by tracks or footprints except for those left by the occasional animal, sometimes for weeks. Those winter storms more than anything else reminded Anders how isolated they all were. That untouched ground served as the cruelest reminder that no one in the world wanted to touch the mages locked away on their island. It made it too easy to forget that there was an outside world at all.

Most of his ill-fated escape attempts took place in the autumn or winter; one had sent him out into a blizzard. He'd been caught within a day, dragged back to the tower, berated for being stupid enough to run out into such a brutal storm. The couple of templars that still spoke to him then honestly did seem curious when they asked: What was he thinking? Was he suicidal?

He hadn't answered, he never did.

"Might be bad," Anders whispers, turning back to Lirene. "If a storm comes."

She nods, and pushes Kai out the door, telling him to get on home. Anders, she lets stay. He wraps the still-unfinished quilt left behind by the refugee woman around his shoulders.

"I can't keep him out of the trade forever," she tells Anders, her voice that familiar mixture of pointed accusation and apology. "Not if the Coterie's got an eye on him."

Anders sighs, and scratches his eyebrow. "You knew the Hawk, when she was that age?" he asks carefully.

Lirene nods. "I did. She was just Callin, then."

 _Callin_. Before she had a street name. When she was just a girl. He wonders if that's how she thinks of herself.

She's has been avoiding him, he thinks. Or maybe she's just disappeared into her alienage shelter. He isn't sure if he should be bothered by this; if there's anything  _to_ avoid. It's not like they're friends. He barely knows her. They run into one another every now and then, in the Hanged Man, or on the docks, and he hears her name more and more frequently in the clinic, as rumors of her activities on the streets swirl and grow. She's made significant inroads into Coterie territory, near single-handedly, if the whispers can be believed. She's cemented alliances with the dockmaster and the City Guard too. She's more a force of nature than a true person in these retellings. Somehow, that doesn't surprise him either.

"What can you tell me about her?"

A familiar smirk plays on Lirene's face. Anders rolls his eyes. "Don't give me that. She's just a kid." A kid in a lot of danger. And Lirene knows it too. She sighs and hops up onto the countertop. Anders has a pretty good idea how she must be feeling. Exhausted. And like nothing you do can ever be enough.

"She's a child of Kirkwall," comes the reply. "Like all the rest of 'em."

Anders frowns. The girl's dark hair and pale skin are equally common on both sides of the Waking Sea, he knows. But he wouldn't have pegged her as belonging to this city. Not by birth, anyway. "Refugee?" he asks softly.

"In a manner of speaking."

Anders nods. All apostates are refugees. She'd have moved about, if she were smart. Wouldn't she?

"She knows how to use her magic," Anders insists urgently. "She's  _trained._ And more powerful than half the Circle apprentices her age." She hasn't sought him out. She insists she knows what she's doing when they do see each other. She says she's fine.

But a mage that strong will be a tempting target for threats from both sides of the Veil.

Lirene shrugs, as though it doesn't much matter. To her, it wouldn't. "Her father taught her what he could, 'fore he died."

Anders nearly chokes. His eyes sting. His head hurts and his stomach feels empty. "Her father?" he repeats. He stares up at Lirene with open, desperate confusion. Mages don't have families. Not ever.

"Girl was left orphaned when the templars finally caught up to him. Miracle she escaped them, really. Her uncle took her in, her an' her brother. He didn' turn her over to the Gallows, which is about the best I can say for him."

"She's got family?"

Lirene shrugs. "She's got me. And Athenril's gang."

"That's  _not_ a family," Anders growls.

He calls forth a few flickering sparks to light the couple of ragged candles Lirene has managed to make last. She blows out the one nearest her, and smiles at him weakly. Anders sits in the dim light, and kneads at the headache spreading quickly at the edges of his skull.

He blinks his eyes, but the fog of exhaustion only seems to settle more closely around him. He stares down, at the inside of his left arm, where a jagged scar marks him as Chantry-owned. He knows that some of the Circle's children were lucky enough to have someone be gentle when taking blood for a phylactery - Rhyanon had never had a scar like his. He'd been young still, alone and terrified, fighting hard, but not hard enough. The templars had cut him deep enough to really hurt, and he hadn't had the power or the knowledge yet to heal himself. Those skills had come to him quickly, within the first year, and the natural talent he'd shown made him rare. His skill at healing bought him his life, and doomed him, for the Chantry couldn't afford to lose someone so useful, and so dangerous. Maybe they would have sent him to cities just like this one: the slums of Amaranthine or Denerim, to heal the illnesses that prey on the helpless just as easily there. But probably not. They'd have kept him in the Chantry, for those who could afford the tithes, if they gave him any leash at all.

He cracks his knuckles and tells Lirene he's headed for the clinic. She nods. Her eyes are still deep wells filled with concern, but she won't stop him. She'll send people his way, even, when they don't have anywhere else to go. It unnerves him that so many other people come to him for help when he seems so incapable of even helping himself, but the fact that they do gives him the sense of purpose he so desperately needs. But his reserves of mana are wearing too thin. He's using too much, draining himself, not allowing himself enough time to rest or recover. How can he, when desperate mothers bring their starving, pain-stricken children to him, more and more?

He won't complain though. He's doing what he was put on this plane to do. The clustered hovels of Lowtown, and especially the open sewers of Darktown, spread disease as quickly as fire. Most of the children he sees, in the midst of the depths of winter's vicious plague, cannot hold down food even if there were enough to give them. He does what he can, but too many wait too long to ask for help. By the time they find him, all he can do is watch them die.

He scrubs at his dirt-caked skin with a rough cloth and a thin sliver of soap. He uses a kitchen bowl half full of water that is only dubiously clean. There are times - not many, obviously, but  _some_  - when he does miss the Tower. This is one of those times. He sighs with wistful longing when he pictures the rooms full of baths, tubs that could always be magically heated, no matter what the weather was like outside. He finishes washing as quickly as he can as dresses himself in the warmest clothes he can find.

Outside, the storm has come, as promised. It falls in heavy flakes; already it's beginning to gather in cracks at corners of his clinic, coming in under the door and through the gaps in the roof that he has not yet been able to patch or cover. Anders keeps a fire burning, fueling it with magic, trying to make his limited firewood last.

The snow barricades people into their ramshackle homes, to huddle around inadequate warmth. His worst suspicions are confirmed by those few brave enough to venture out to his clinic, banging weakly on the door, coughing and slipping on the ice. Anders opens the door and studies the children who watch him with wary eyes. Some shiver so violently that their whole bodies shake, others are sullen and silent, hiding in corners wrapped in as many layers as they can find. He can't help them, beyond providing a warm fire and a few distractions: flickering sparks shaped into dancing dragons. The children watch his magical tricks with dull eyes, and a few rare, shy smiles.

Anders works himself to exhaustion. Hours slip away, maybe days. The perpetual grey haze of midwinter makes it hard to judge the passage of time.

"That's dangerous, isn't it?" Lirene asks softly, and Anders whirls around, squeezing his eyes shut and forcing himself to calm his racing heart and quell the crackle of unformed power coiling around his fingers, waiting to be shaped and wielded.

"Of course it's dangerous!" he snaps at her, but the woman doesn't flinch. She  _should_. Anders grabs a skin of wine and drinks it in long gulps, forcing himself to calm. "What're you doing here?" he spits. His voice is hard. The empty vial of lyrium still rests on the tips of his curled fingers; the drug buzzes under his skin, spiking mana like crashing waves through his body.

He pushes his way past the Fereldan shopkeeper and kneels next to a cot occupied by a young man who thrashes and kicks, moaning through a fever daze. He curls up tightly, clawing at his stomach. The boy is too weak to move; his skin is soaked with sweat, his blankets stained with the shit that runs, seemingly without end, from his bowels. The smell no longer bothers Anders - to tell the truth he barely notices, even with the lyrium enhancing his senses. He sees with a kind of tunnel-vision, a direct conduit of the life-force between himself and the people he buys his freedom by healing. He takes the boy's callus-roughened hands in his own, and he bows his head, closes his eyes, mumbles a few words.

From a distance, Lirene thinks, he looks like he might be praying.

She holds her breath as she watches him work, knowing, as she always has, that there isn't much to see. Anders' muscles tense, and he bites his lip hard enough to draw blood. His breathing gets shallow and fast, his palms grow sweaty and slick.

Eventually, he opens his eyes again, and when Lirene meets that gaze it is dark and dull and exhausted. He shakes his head, and withdraws, hiding as well as he can behind a thin curtain.

Lirene returns to the boy on the bed. She sits with him as he is dying, carried off by the same virulent flu that has claimed half of Darktown as its life toll. There are those who claim that Kirkwall is a cursed city, fueled by blood and sacrifice. Lirene has never been one for ghost stories or fairy tales, but in these foul, choking winters, she can't see how they're wrong.

Anders stirs slightly when Lirene rests her hand on his shoulder. He flinches, and jerks to a sitting position. He still looks dazed though, and his eyes barely seem to focus.

Lirene's lips are drawn into a thin line, and she won't meet his eyes. "You did the best you could," she insists, with quiet force. "No one expects a miracle."

That only makes him more defensive. Of  _course_ that's what they expect. "Did he have…" Anders begins to ask. His voice is hoarse, and barely audible. His eyes flicker toward Lirene's, and she recognizes the desperation in them. He's just a boy, looking for approval. He needs help as much as any of them. It's too easy to forget that.

"No family," she assures him, softly. Of course, she doesn't know that for a fact. The Kirkwall streets collect children and mercenaries like driftwood washed up on a tide. This nameless boy is one of too many. And Anders still believes it was his duty to save him. He closes his eyes and sinks into a chair, exhausted and overwhelmed.

"We'll have to…"

Lirene takes his hand in hers, and massages it gently. It does nothing to quell the extreme tension in him, and his eyes are still closed. But she'd like to believe her closeness can help him. "I'm going to blow out the lantern," she says softly. "Anders, you need to rest."

He knows she's right, so he just gives her a listless nod. He doesn't want to let himself sleep though. The nightmares won't let him sleep. They're getting worse lately. He wakes up sometimes and it's hard to breathe, as he fights against walls that aren't there. The crumbling rock sewers of Darktown, its hovels and caves, pull at a part of him that he tries as hard as he can to bury. There are whispers in his mind, the kind that followed him in the Deep Roads, the kind that  _clawed_ at him through long months in a solitary cell in the forgotten basements of Kinloch Hold. He can't stay here, trapped inside. He struggles to push his door open, and stumbles through the drifts of blowing snow. The air bites at his skin, and he breathes it in. His lips are chapped and broken, and he shivers even through his layers of clothes. But it still feels better than not-sleeping in the dark, cramped spaces where he is chased by ghosts.


	8. Panic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Running away from the Circles himself, he's done plenty of times, but never especially _well_. They always track him down again. And this won't be as simple as that. It isn't innocent. He might be putting children in mortal danger. And the scariest thing is that it still doesn't feel wrong.

Something bangs frantically against Anders' door, as he reaches out to push it open. He instinctively calls up his mana. His heart hammers in his chest, too fast. His senses are on high alert, searching for a threat, yet it still takes him too long to recognize the soft sounds of shuffling feet and a small, sheepish voice. "Sorry." Then, after a moment, "Can I come in? Please, Anders. I need help."

Anders breathes out slowly, letting go of the magic fighting within him, surging desperately against the barriers he channels it against. It takes longer than it should to regain control. Several long seconds. When he can focus again, enough to push the door open against the resistance of several inches worth of piled up snow, a familiar adolescent boy is staring at him, slightly open-mouthed.

"Kai. What are you doing here?"

The kid looks lost. He shivers in the falling snow. He looks like he hasn't slept. He probably hasn't even gone home. Anders realizes he doesn't even know where the boy lives, if he truly has a home to go to. "Come inside," he says, before he can change his mind.

Since he's standing next to his makeshift kitchen anyway, Anders picks up a bowl and ladles in some watery soup. The pot has been waiting over a low fire for hours, since Lirene started it before she left the night before, in the vain hope that Anders might eat it. He offers it to his guest, and tries to pretend that this is normal. The truth is, he is just too exhausted to care much. The meal is thin and almost tasteless, but it's warm, and Kai accepts it gratefully. As he eats, he keeps opening his mouth as if about to speak, then snapping it shut again and returning his focus to his soup. The bowl isn't large enough for finishing it to take very long, yet even when it has been emptied for several minutes, Kai remains perched on a rickety stool, staring at Anders.

Though he's gotten used to Kai's hovering around looking for guidance, or friendship, it irritates Anders that the boy looks for it  _here_. Shouldn't he have friends his own age somewhere? Isn't that what kids are supposed to do?

His obvious selfishness constricts around his heart, and he runs his hand through his hair and starts fumbling around through empty vials and his too-small stockpile of herbs. He starts crushing elfroot with a mortar and pestle and he lets the intensity of the motion work out some of his stress. Kai watches, shifting and unsettled, still stumbling over the words he can't seem to be able to say.

"Here," the mage finally snaps, exasperated. He shoves the mortar and pestle into the boy's hands.

Kai squirms and avoids meeting Anders' eyes. "I need help," he pleads. "Well, not really me. Somebody else."

"Your brother?"

Kai shakes his head. "No. He doesn't really care about me anymore."

Anders bites his lip. He wonders if that's true. But it doesn't even matter, does it? Not down here.

"Never mind," Kai whispers. "It was stupid anyway."

"You know I'll help if I can, Kai." He tries to sound patient. He tries to sound kind. He tries to sound like he isn't on the edge of losing it completely. Kai isn't making it easy.

"You can't," the boy insists.

"Why don't you let me decide that?" Anders replies. He grinds his teeth. Outside, wind still howls. Snow still falls. He is still stuck here, boxed in by these claustrophobic walls, tired and on edge.

Kai rubs his face with his hands, looking nearly as exhausted as Anders feels. He's scared too. But he starts to talk, in halting whispers. He asks Anders if he remembers the candy he'd given him in the Lowtown market.

Anders nods. Of course he remembers.

Kai tells him about how he'd smuggled the treats into the Gallows, slipped them to a friend of his, through the bars that blocked the mages' courtyard from the docks. The girl is of an age with him, they'd grown up together. And now… they can't see each other anymore. Kai is full of familiar frustrated anger as he admits that his friend had asked her not to come back. She'd looked scared, almost haunted. He'd seen the bruises that she hadn't been able to hide, her swollen lip… A shadow crosses Anders' face, and Kai tenses up too, responding to that cresting wave of anger. He watches Anders cautiously, still pleading.

"What are you asking for?" Anders asks carefully.

"I knew you couldn't help," Kai mutters.

"I didn't say that." Anders sighs, and leans against the edge of the table. He is  _so tired_. The whole world feels like it's spinning out of his control. "Kai, do you what 'apostate' means?" he asks carefully.

"It's what you are."

Anders nods.

"It means living on borrowed time. I know you're afraid for your friend. But this life…" But he trails off before he can even finish the sentence. He knows it's illogical, to anyone who hasn't been in a Circle. How could this be better, this constant uncertainty? But it is. He looks Kai in the eyes, man to man. The boy may be young, but he's not  _wrong_. "I'll help you. You and your friend. I'll do what I can."

"Thank you, Anders!" Kai looks young again, now that he's smiling. He still believes that there can be a rescue. Anders doesn't have it in him to shatter that delusion. The truth is that the shadow of the Gallows looms over Kirkwall's slums and alleys, a constant dark presence that the people living here have absorbed in every facet of their lives.

"It'll take time. You'll have to be patient. I'll have to…"  _Fuck_. He almost throws something as the full weight of what he's just taken on settles over him. Running away from the Circles himself, he's done plenty of times, but never especially  _well_. They always track him down again. And this won't be as simple as that. It isn't innocent. He might be putting children in mortal danger. And the scariest thing is that it still doesn't feel wrong.

Kai sits in the deep shadows of the darkened clinic, where mere hours ago a boy his age was alive, and now isn't. "I was just… heading out," Anders says, trying to keep his voice as steady as he can manage when all he wants to do is run. "Come on. I'll get you a real meal."

"I can't," Kai replies.

He doesn't elaborate, and Anders almost takes the boy's choice away. But he isn't a babysitter, and he's barely holding  _himself_ together. So he lets Kai go. But he doesn't stop worrying. It's been too long time since Anders has been forced to confront the reality of being an apostate in this town. He'd started to imagine he was safe. He should've known better. It never lasts. It  _never_ lasts. Walking alone through the narrow twisting maze of Darktown only makes it more obvious just how trapped he is.

Somehow, he makes it to the Hanged Man, but by the time he does, the thought of going inside, of being forced to speak to anyone else, to blend in, to pretend to be normal, it feels too overwhelming. It's beyond his ability at the moment. There is no one else around who will be able to ease him into conversation or deflect attention from him. He can't go in. He won't go back. He sinks to the ground just outside the door, looking for all the world like any other beggar shivering in the streets.

He doesn't know how much time passes, whether it's minutes or hours. He taps his fingers against his leg, restless agitation stirring through him as the sun rises and grows brighter and turns the sky into a uniform grey-white sheet. His other hand clenches tight to a notebook that he barely remembers grabbing as he left the clinic. He huddles against the filthy wall, watching the wind off the harbor push the sign back and forth above his head. He can hear the creaking of the chains that hold up the heavy wooden board.

He draws his cloak up over his head, as much to hide his face as to shield himself from the wind.

"There's not much point in hiding if you're going to leave all your plots and plans out in the open for anyone walking by to see."

Anders tips his head back, letting his hood slide away from his face. He's completely unsurprised to find the Hawk hovering over him. There's a slight defensiveness in her voice even when she's making joking accusations. Or maybe it's not a joke. It's hard to tell, with her.

"I'm just drawing," he points out. There's an edge of hostility in his words too, and he's not quite sure what that's about. He shouldn't let her rile him. He's talked to enough girls in his life that it should be easy.

"Really?" She sits down beside him, not seeming to notice or care about the mud-soaked street. She spends a few moments quietly studying the lines and curves he's sketched against the heavy paper. "Why?"

He frowns, and glances up. "What do you mean, why?"

She stares at him. It feels like neither of them are breathing. Anders finds himself studying the color of her eyes. Are they grey? Or green? They remind him of a forest. He feels a squirm of guilt run up his spine. It's none of his business what color her eyes are.

"I mean, why are you sitting out here in the snow  _drawing_?"

Anders carefully closes up his notebook, and shifts his body into a slightly more comfortable position. "It's not snowing," he says calmly.

"It might as well be."

It's cold and wet and miserable. The lack of precipitation currently falling from the sky seems more accidental than anything. "What are you doing here?" he asks pointedly.

Hawk shrugs. Her fingers twitch at her side, and her eyes flit from one shadow to another, alert to threats - and opportunities.

Anders raises an eyebrow. "Should I check to see if I still have coin in my pocket?"

"You don't have any money."

He laughs, then - out loud, a genuine, honestly surprised bark. A suspicious frown crosses Hawk's face. Anders rolls his eyes. "Oh, lighten up. I'm not laughing  _at_ you."

She crosses her arms over her chest and glares at him. "Yes, you are."

"Fine. Maybe I am. What are you going to do about it?"

"Shouldn't you be… I dunno? Curing people?"

"Shouldn't you be stealing something?"

"I'm  _trying_."

"Liar." He grabs her hand, without waiting to second-guess himself, and pulls her into the tavern. The door slams shut behind them, and the few patrons scattered about the place lift sleepy heads from the tabletops and stare at them with confused frowns.

"We're hungry," Anders announces to the tired-looking middle-aged woman behind the bar. "We'll take whatever you've got that won't kill us."

Hawk rolls her eyes, but Anders notices that she doesn't protest when he sets the bowl of questionable stew in front of her. She mops it up with a thin chunk of old, hard bread. Anders sits across from her, noticing through some old instinct that she's chosen a table in a shadowed corner, one that lets them see both the front entrance and the bar. He nods approval.

His stomach rumbles as he eats, slowly, taking the time to savor the subtleties of the gravy that spills down his lip. He lets his bread soften in the bowl and fishes it out with his spoon. He still needs to eat, even when he doesn't think he wants to. It's easier, somehow, with Hawk sitting across from him, smiling as she finishes her own meal.

But she won't stop looking at him. It's unnerving. Even more so when she still makes no effort to hide the knives strapped to various easily accessible parts of her body. And he can  _feel_ her, anyway. He knows she doesn't need a weapon to be dangerous.

"Is there something you want?" he finally asks. He is all tension and nervousness right now, a bowstring about to be pulled. A weapon about to fire. She has to be able to feel it. But if she's bothered by his suspicious outburst, she doesn't show it.

"You're smuggling people out of the Gallows." She doesn't bother to hide her awe - and the way she says it, he knows that she  _knows_ , that it isn't just a rumor she's heard. There hasn't even been time for rumors to spread. He hasn't even really  _decided_. Not irrevocably. He isn't prepared to admit to anything close to the truth, not out loud. Not even to her. He avoids it instead. He hasn't even done anything yet, anyway. It's just a thought, still. It can't get him in trouble. He stares at anything but Hawk: at his soup, at the table, at the cold grey sunlight spilling in through the cracks in the walls.

"Stay out of it," he demands.

"You have no idea what you're doing!"

It's not the first time she's told him, in no uncertain terms, what she thinks about the idea of going up against the templars. Even though he swears to himself that that's  _not_ what he's doing.

He raises an eyebrow, looks her over. A little girl playing dress-up. Getting in over her head. This isn't her fight. It's none of her damn business "And you do?" he asks, all bitterness. Pushing her away to save her. He doesn't want her involved. Why does she keep showing up? Why can't he hide from her?

"I know I'm not gonna let you get yourself killed," she mutters.

"I didn't know you cared."

"Of course I care!"

The force of her tone forces Anders out of his pathetic spiral of spite and self-pity. He looks up - at the stubborn determination on her face, the slight pout that almost  _dares_  him to say something. Maker, in this moment she reminds him so much of someone else.

His stomach hurts. "I can't," he whispers. "I can't… be that. Not for you. Not for anyone."

"What in the Void are you talking about?"

 _I don't want you to care about me_ , he almost says. "Nothing," he says instead, still slightly rattled.

Hawk studies him for a long moment, and he almost apologizes, or changes his mind. But she doesn't give him enough time, thank the Maker. She disappears, and Anders doesn't chase her.

He watches the door slam shut behind her, aided by the winter winds.

"I see you're still making a mess of things with women," an oddly familiar voice drawls. It doesn't sound anything like Kirkwall.

Anders lifts his eyes and tilts his chair back against the wall, taking in the buxom, caramel-skinned rogue he remembers from…  _from the Pearl_ , whispers a long-buried voice in his head. His jaw drops, and his eyes track Isabela as she prances across the room, smiling at him as she flips a dagger between her fingers.

Anders hunches his shoulders, closing in on himself without it being a conscious choice.

"Oh relax," Isabela pouts. "I'm not going to stab you." She slides her knife back into the holster resting at her hip. "Unless you want me to," she teases. She grins so widely that Anders can't help but noticing the bright whiteness of her teeth. She slides into his lap and wraps her arms around his neck, and he only swallows hard, trying, and failing, to summon the words that could push her away. She runs her fingers lightly up the back of his neck. Strands of his sweaty hair wrap around her fingers. "Long way from home," she whispers in his ear.

It takes a lot of willpower to combat the way she makes him feel. Isabela knows how to do things with those fingers that have made him sweat and scream. A long time ago. In another lifetime. It's not like he'd ever made her any  _promises_. "I don't have a home," he reminds her.

"Neither do I," she purrs sweetly. Her fingers begin to trace up the inside of his thigh, and he can feel that gentle pressure even through his trousers.

He grunts, and shrugs her off, ignoring how close she stays. "You should put some clothes on."

"Oh, whatever," the pirate smirks. "It's not my fault you haven't gotten laid in… how long  _has_ it been?"

"You don't know anything about me."

"I know enough."

She holds his gaze, and Anders refuses to break the contact. He becomes aware of his own ragged breathing. Isabela runs her fingers over his hand, tracing the knuckles he has clenched so tightly that they're turning white. "I'll keep your secret," she reminds him, honestly. "I have so far, haven't I?"

"You didn't know I was  _here_." He is…  _almost_  certain of that. Neither the Chantry nor the Wardens would contract a freelancer to hunt him down. Otherwise, he's already screwed.

"'Course I didn't. That doesn't change anything. You think I don't have just as much to lose as you? We can't go ratting each other out."

"You're not a mage."

She rolls her eyes. "No. Just a pirate." She pushes herself a little closer to him, and Anders catches her without thinking. "You know this fucking city has a history of selling criminals into slavery."

"They don't do that anymore."

"No. Now they just kill us."

She's not wrong. This city is brutal for just about everyone in it. "So what are you doing here, then?"

"Making money," Isabela replies easily. "What about you?"

"I don't know," Anders replies softly, after a while.

"You never do."

"What do you mean?" he asks carefully. He knows full well that Isabela is a lot smarter than she lets people think. And she knew him before Kirkwall, which means she knows him better than anyone else in this city, even if their relationship had lasted barely more than a week before her infamous "tides" carried her out to sea again, and that week had been filled with far more sex than talking.

"Who says I have to mean something?" she purrs.

She grinds her body against his, and Anders clenches his teeth. That was a long time ago. He  _almost_ tells her that. "Nobody," he insists, instead. He holds her gaze, to prove that he is perfectly capable of thinking clearly no matter how forcefully she tries to lead him astray. "But you  _do_ mean something."

Isabela settles back, still on his lap, but calmer now, somehow. "Maybe," she admits. She slides a fingernail through her teeth.

Anders sighs. "I think I liked it better when we just got drunk and fucked and forgot it in the morning."

"Who says we can't?"

"I do," he insists. "I don't do that anymore."

"Pity. I was hoping you could do that… thing. With the electricity. None of my other boys have quite your talents."

He shrugs. "Yeah, well. I'm not your boy anymore."

"You never were, and don't think I don't know that. You don't belong to anybody but yourself." She kisses his cheek, quickly, before sauntering off. But she turns back to him before she can get to far away, and lifts a mug she's picked up from another table. "I'll still look out for you, Anders. You can trust me."

He nods, though he's not sure he believes it. He finishes the last of his bowl of stew and pulls out his notebook again. He doesn't open it though. He suddenly feels like there are too many eyes on him. He leans back again, resting against the wall, trying to force his thoughts to come together into some kind of  _plan_. He tries  _not_ to be aware that it's two women in about ten minutes who've walked out on him. He's losing his edge. Maybe he really does need to get laid.  _Fuck_.

He could, he knows he could. The windows of the Blooming Rose are all slammed shut at this hour, though if he went inside the proprietor would take his coin and rouse one of her girls. Or boys. But Anders wasn't lying when he told Bela that he doesn't do that anymore. He's here for a  _reason_. He can't pinpoint when that happened, but he's become the kind of person that feels guilty about paying for a throwaway fuck, or lying, even by omission. He smiles an ironic smile at the thought of all the Chantry lectures he'd ignored, growing up. They had  _so_ loved to lecture him, although he's pretty sure they'd never believe he was actually filing away every single word. Just because he wasn't listening doesn't mean he didn't  _hear_. It's not like he owes them. But he owes himself. He owes other people.

He told Kai he'd try. He forces himself to hold a few things in his mind - the desperation in the boy's voice when he'd asked, the too-clear memories of fear and loneliness, the reverberating echo of gates slamming shut. He has to do this.

His mana flares to life, growing brighter, stirring and flickering under his skin, the closer he gets to the Gallows. It's not anything anyone can actually  _see_ , but he can feel it. It's obvious. He tells himself that it won't be obvious to anyone outside, not if he's careful, if he doesn't release any of it  _no matter what_.

 _What are you doing_? he asks himself, over and over again, but the answer is simple: keeping a promise. His heart beats loudly in his chest, like a steady, too-fast drum. The rhythm carries him into the Gallows courtyard. It's harder now even than it was last time. This time he's here alone, and with no pretense to disguise his illicit presence in this space.

"You there! Stop!"

Anders almost breaks and runs, but he doesn't. Just his time, he doesn't. He forces himself to calmly turn around, to just barely meet the eyes of the young templar barking the command.

"Is there a problem, Ser?" he asks softly. He lets a little bit of a tremor slip into his voice. He tells himself it isn't out of character for a regular person to be afraid of a templar. That little tremor of fear flares into terror when he quickly recognizes that this isn't just  _any_ templar. It's clear in the Fereldan accent still audible in the man's voice. He even looks the same - a little bit older, but still the same. This is Cullen. Knight Captain Cullen, second only to the Knight Commander, almost in charge of this whole prison. And perhaps the  _one_ templar in this whole Maker-forsaken town who is capable of recognizing Anders by sight.

And recognize him he does. Cullen's eyes widen, and his fingers wrap tightly around the sword hilt at his hip.

Anders swallows hard. " _Please,_ " he whispers. It's more of a prayer than an actual request, although he doesn't trust the Maker to hear him any more than he trusts a templar to listen. He doesn't trust anyone, least of all himself. He can already feel the mana gathering, underneath his skin. It takes  _years_  of carefully practiced willpower to keep any of it from slipping. He can see Cullen sweating, aware of the static discharge gathering around as Anders barely keeps control of the mana that roils around inside him, desperate to be let out. It isn't visible to any senses but that magical awareness that they both share.

"What are you doing here?" Cullen asks. His voice is hard and dangerous now. He's grown up. They both have.

"Nothing," Anders replies.  _His_  voice is soft, and meek, and Maker, it  _kills_  him how close it is to begging, but he can't go back. He  _won't_.

Cullen's eyes flicker over him. Anders holds his breath, hating that he has to trust this man. Again. Cullen always gave him a fair shot. He clings to that knowledge. They used to be... not friends, but allies, maybe. As much as a templar and a mage ever could be. This isn't Kinloch Hold. Their history may not matter. "Please," Anders repeats. He looks Cullen in the eye, no longer worried if the templar sees him as desperate or damaged. He  _is_. He's desperate and damaged and terrified. He'll do anything.

"I've heard rumors of a healer in Darktown," Cullen says, soft and serious. "That's you?"

It's not  _exactly_ a question, but Anders nods.

"Get out of here," Cullen growls. He glances over his shoulder, quickly, through the thick bars just behind him. Then he adds, more softly: "Be careful."

Anders nods. He almost runs. He can feel the pressure of the Knight Captain's attention: Cullen is watching him,  _only_ him. But he stops anyway, a few steps away from the gate where the templar stands guard. "Cullen," he murmurs, so softly that it's only a guess whether the other man can even hear him. "You be careful too?"

The templar gives him a serious nod, and Anders retreats from the Gallows.

He doesn't feel like he's gained anything. But then he hasn't lost anything either. And that might be saying a lot.


	9. Entangled

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I can't make any promises, Hawk. Not anymore."  
> "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"  
> "It means I'm not your savior. I'm not anybody's savior. I'm just a screwup apostate."  
> "Well, so am I!"

Hawk meets with Aveline at one of the cafés that have recently begun sprouting up around Hightown, in weak imitation of the similar outdoor patios of Val Royeaux, where culture and secrets are shared equally over small cups of espresso. Neither woman looks truly at place here, among the well-dressed nobles who flaunt both their cash and their free time. But Aveline is wearing her Guard armor, so people maintain a respectful enough distance. And Hawk cleans up well enough to look like a proper young lady if she has to. People frown at her occasionally, unable to immediately recognize her, but their curiosity quickly disintegrates as they assume she must not be anyone worth knowing.

Aveline is on edge almost to the point of paranoid, and it makes Hawk incredibly nervous. Hawk pours herself a cup of coffee from the pot in the middle of the table, and sips it slowly, pointedly. She still doesn't enjoy these regular meetings with the Fereldan refugee who now runs the Guard in everything but name. But she has come to appreciate their value, if only because knowing where the law is focusing its attention tells her where  _not_ to be.

"There's been a spree of robberies among some of the nobles' estates," Aveline says, as though she is sharing a bit of gossip with a friend. Hawk shrugs and does her best to look innocent, knowing she isn't fooling anyone.

"There are always robberies in Hightown. They're hardly worth talking about." Aveline purses her lips into a thin line, then reluctantly drinks some coffee, frowning at the bitterness. "Don't waste my time," Hawk insists. "What do you really want?"

If anything, Aveline's mood grows even darker. She's not the type who is easily pushed around, especially by a girl still not out of her teens. But making this into a childish argument serves no one.

"The Viscount's son has disappeared."

"That sounds inconvenient."

Aveline rolls her eyes, while Hawk continues to casually sip at her coffee. "The Viscount doesn't want 'the Guard swarming around his private chambers drawing unwanted attention.' He's afraid… well, there was no ransom note. But he seems to think that we can find the boy without being allowed to actually  _do_ anything that would help in the search."

"Did you ever think maybe the kid doesn't want to be found? Maybe he just ran away. Could you blame him?"

"Not especially," Aveline agrees, surprisingly. She does it through clenched teeth, but Hawk finds herself impressed all the same. She's gotten used to the people in Hightown being willfully blind to its problems. It's a blindness that serves her very well, so she's not about to complain, but the fact that Aveline is willing to admit that maybe not everyone would want to stay in the gilded, gated mansions of the nobles' district proves she's paying far more attention than most. Maybe it's because she's not from this city. Who knows?

Hawk scratches behind her ear and narrows her eyes. "Why do you think I know anything about this?"

"Because, girl, you've proven yourself somewhat over the years. The Coterie stretches itself thin trying to fight against both the Carta and your upstart organization. Athenril must be very pleased. You've won her enough territory lately."

Hawk shrugs, trying to not to let on just exactly how much it unnerves her to have the woman keeping such close tabs on what she's been doing. She taps her leg up and down under the table, but doesn't blink as she watches the guard. "We both have to make our bosses happy," she says, all smooth diplomacy. Aveline nods once, conceding the point. "Your boss is the Viscount. He put you in charge of an unofficial investigation?"

Aveline scowls. An unofficial investigation. Hawk is more right than she knows. It means she gets to do all of the work with none of the credit. Maker forgive her for being the type of person who will do the job anyway, even knowing she's being taken advantage of. She finishes the last bitter dregs from the tiny serving of coffee and glares at the apostate sitting across from her. "This isn't some noble's power play. Whoever took the boy moves in your circles, Hawk."

"We're not kidnappers. Illicit goods, sure. Not people."

"Coterie's been involved in the slave trade before."

"Not in this town. Not since the refugee crisis ended, anyway. Not seriously."

There are still those who try to rope in the stupid and desperate, especially in the alienage, but Fenris has taken it upon himself to keep the neighborhood clear of slavers, and most of the ones who are stupid enough to reveal themselves become particularly gruesome examples to others. Open raids are unheard of, now, something Aveline is certainly aware of. Killing the slave trade is one of the simplest motivations for going after the Coterie. It's not the real reason Hawk does it, of course, but it gives her a little bit of justification. Helps her pretend, for a little while, that she might actually be doing some good.

"You really think Coterie has him?" she asks Aveline carefully. It doesn't make any sense. What would they get from taking the Viscount's son?

"I don't know, Hawk, that's what I'm asking you to find out!"

The outburst draws unwelcome attention, and Hawk squirms in her seat. She still has knives within reach, though not so obvious as they usually are, not up here in Hightown in the middle of the day. The apostate glares at the Guard. And Aveline sounds so desperate that Hawk doesn't even bother what's in it for her. It could be a lot, if she plays her cards right. And she hasn't committed to anything. But it isn't the Coterie, that much is obvious. What the hell is she getting herself into?

"I'll see what I can find out, okay?"

Aveline looks genuinely relieved. It's the first time Hawk has ever seen the woman smile. "Thank you."

"Usual fee," Hawk reminds her. That makes the guard scowl again, but Hawk knows there isn't any true anger behind it. She gives the woman a cheerful wave, and heads out into the cold and cloudy day.

The wide boulevards of Hightown still make her feel too exposed, but there is someone else she needs to see while she's up here. The City Guard is being much more obvious about their presence, no doubt attempting to placate the nobles' fears as rumors of the Viscount's son's disappearance start to spread. Those few wealthy residents of the neighborhood who feel safe leaving their guarded estates walk in groups, eyeing everyone who passes them with suspicion if not outright sneers. Hawk does her best to ignore them. She sticks to the alleys, for the most part, out of habit and because it means she doesn't have to worry about keeping out of the way of passing carriages in the main streets.

She's being followed. She stops, drawing a knife and spinning around. "What do you want?" she spits. Visibility is still limited by the snow, which is falling heavily again now, after its brief break.

"Hello, Hawk," Anders says aloud.

She throws one of her smaller knives, lightning quick - not at him, but close enough to make her feelings obvious. He picks it up after it has clattered to the ground at his feet, and smirks at her.

Above them, the Chantry bells toll, deep and long. Even the church's golden spires have been choked by the ice.

"Stop following me," Hawk spits.

"It's a free country. Or so I've heard."

"What do you want?" she asks again.

Anders only shrugs. "Are we pretending this morning didn't happen, then?" He keeps glancing over his shoulder. Like someone is chasing him.

"Nothing happened this morning," Hawk growls.

But she hesitates just a little too long before she says it. And she lets him come a little too close to her. She doesn't push him away. Damn it.

"You're going to get us both killed," she insists. "I don't know what you're doing and I don't want to. But, Anders… please." She doesn't even know what she's asking, not really. She grabs his hand, holding tightly. His fingers are frigid, but she isn't surprised. Her breath puffs out into the cold winter air as she talks. " _Listen to me_ ," she insists, and she sounds much older than her nineteen years. He looks into her eyes, and he listens, and she keeps talking. "I'm not going to tell you to stop, whatever you're doing. I don't  _care_. But this city is better, now that you're here. We need you to stay safe. We can't… I can't lose you. Okay? Please."

She holds her breath, waiting for a response. Anders lets go of her hand. "I can't make any promises, Hawk. Not anymore."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means I'm not your savior. I'm not anybody's savior. I'm just a screwup apostate."

"Well, so am I! But at least I'm fucking trying. At least I won't give up!"

"Don't you dare talk to me about giving up, Hawk! You don't have the first fucking clue what you're talking about."

They stare at each other in the shadowed alleyway, fists clenched and mana barely kept in check. Hawk is terrified and desperate, reaching out to the first person in her life who might actually understand her rather than just using her. She hasn't let herself reach out to him, she hasn't wanted to let herself admit that she is just like him. She wipes away tears that she can't stop from falling. "Fuck you," she spits.

And then, before she's prepared for it, Anders wraps his arms around her. He smells terrible, like Darktown, but she knows she only notices because she'd gotten pretty to be able to blend in up here. It's easy enough to ignore. She relaxes as his mana washes over her. She's never felt healing that wasn't rushed and desperate and painful; she's never known anyone who's good at it like he is. He makes her slow down. He makes her feel safe. Fuck it.  _Fuck_. She kicks him, hard enough to hurt, and he breaks whatever spell he'd been using to try to steal away her pain.

"I suppose I deserve that," he mutters.

"Whatever. Just stop following me."

"I'm  _not -_ "

She keeps walking, toward the Chantry, the way she was from the start. Anders hesitates, rubbing his rapidly-bruising shin. "Are you coming or not?" she yells over her shoulder.

He jogs the few long strides it takes to catch up with her, grinning like an idiot. "Has anyone ever told you that you're completely impossible?"

He slows down as he recognizes where her path is leading, although he doesn't stop entirely. Curiosity keeps him going, and it grows even stronger as she stops and stands at the gate that wraps itself around the Chantry's land. As in most cities of any size within Thedas, the Church owns a significant amount of valuable land, and their grand cathedral is only the most recognizable part of their territory. Hawk loiters outside the rest of their compound, which is ringed by simple dormitory buildings that surround gardens, and chicken coops. There are stables and training yards. It's almost a small village in its own right, separated from the rest of the bustling city by long-established tradition.

Inside that fenced-in boundary, children shiver and work at their evening chores. Hawk scans their faces with obvious purpose, though it's not long before they retreat into the scattered buildings, looking for warmth.

"Why're you spying on the Chantry orphans?" Anders asks softly.

"I'm  _not_."

Anders' smile only grows. The petulance in the Hawk's tone makes her sound no older than the children she watches in the courtyard. It makes it slightly easier to forget that she's a criminal and a dangerous apostate, except that that's the reason he's so drawn to her. They're both the same. But here she is, lurking around the Chantry itself, and that drives his fascination with her as much at it unsettles him.

"You're here to pray then?" he asks casually, as she leans against the fence.

She glances over just enough to glare at him.

He knows better than to get too tied up with her anyway. Doesn't he?

He reminds himself that he has never done anything but hurt the people close to him. He fled Vigil's Keep to protect the one person in his life he figured might still care about him. He wonders, frequently, if maybe he shouldn't have, but the truth was that it hadn't been any kind of decision at all. When the Chantry sent templars to monitor the Grey Wardens' base of operations, he'd panicked. Their proximity, their spoken and unspoken threats, triggered deep-seated instincts. So he'd run, and left Rhyanon alone to face the consequences, the same way he always had before. So much for freedom.

He hates himself for it, every day, but he can't go back. Maybe Kirkwall is his punishment and penance. Why the hell else would he stay here?

He scowls up at the Chantry, wondering why he keeps finding himself pulled back here. He keeps tracking Hawk in his peripheral vision, but he lets most of his focus land on the echoes of subdued sound that the girl insists she's not paying attention to. Booted feet tromp through the snow and ice, running footsteps, light and panicked. They stop suddenly, as the running child skids to a halt.

Anders looks up, and finds himself staring into the narrowed eyes of a serious-looking dark haired boy. The kid stares back at him, through the fence, for a few long seconds that seem to drag on forever. The boy eventually drops the wooden sword he'd been holding, and runs off, quickly disappearing behind the Chantry's heavy wooden doors.

"He's my brother," Hawk says quietly. There is a hint of challenge in her tone.

Anders licks suddenly dry lips, and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his trousers. He says nothing, just follows the girl as she picks out a path through the icy streets.

"He looks like you," he finally says softly.

She shakes her head. "No, he doesn't."

Anders doesn't reply. It's obvious she knows it isn't true. He just shrugs, and heads for one of the narrow alleyways that will lead back to Darktown, where they both belong.

"I need your help," he says quietly, as they slip through the narrow streets, chasing the setting sun. Hawk stops immediately as soon as he opens his mouth, whirling around to confront him.

"I don't want any part of this."

Anders almost -  _almost_ \- drops it then. But he cannot let this go. He shakes his head, not breaking eye contact. "I don't think that's true," he says softly.

He gives her time to protest, but she doesn't. She still doesn't.

She's still there, ghosting behind him, as he unlocks the door to the clinic. Slid under the door is an envelope, sealed with unmarked red wax. Anders frowns down at the heavy parchment as though it might burn him, but after a second's hesitation he picks it up, taking it over to the nearest cot as Hawk watches. He slides the letter open with a fingernail as he sits down. He's vaguely aware of Hawk sitting down next to him as he begins to read. His breath catches somewhere in his lungs and an uncomfortable sensation somewhere between fear and awe settles in the pit of his stomach.

"Do you know what this is?" he chokes out.

"No," Hawk replies. She's only half paying attention to him; most of her focus is on the stray kitten that's nibbling at one of her boot laces. "What is it?" she asks, looking up.

Instead of trying to explain it, he simply hands her the documents. But she doesn't have the experiences or frames of reference that he does. The templars' orders don't seem secretive or coded to him, but he'd grown up in the same world, learning how to dodge the veiled threats that were so much more frightening than the things they said out loud.

"It's… proof," he says simply, when his companion's knotted eyebrows and confused frown prove she doesn't understand what she is holding. "It's proof that they're using the Rite of Tranquility illegally. If we take this to the Divine, she can't ignore it!"

Hawk's frown deepens, and she makes no effort to disguise her shock. "You want to… talk to the Divine?" she repeats, slowly. "Just… walk up to her and have a conversation?"

Anders sighs, trying to think. "I  _can_ ," he finally decides. "There's sanctuary, even for us. They can't stop mages from praying."

"They can stop  _apostates_  from praying. The Divine is surrounded by templars! Even if she wanted to listen to you, and why would she?"

"I have to try!" he insists.

Because he knows who wrote these letters - well, journal pages, more accurately, long pages of familiar handwriting addressed to him but never intended to be delivered. He runs his fingers over the tightly looping scrawl; it's Karl. All of his observations and fears and questions and doubts, recorded, until they suddenly just… stop.

"Do you know what Tranquility  _is_?" he asks Hawk.

"It's when they take away your magic," she whispers. The reverence in her words proves to Anders that she rightly fears it. At least she knows enough to fear it. He wonders, not for the first time, how much her father had managed to share with her before the opportunity was ripped away.

"They take away everything," Anders confirms. He carefully folds up the letter, tucking it into the locked drawer where other half-finished notes lay scrawled and hidden. "I'd rather be dead."

Hawk nods, and although she retreats into herself, Anders can feel swirls of her power, clinging close to her skin, a layer of something invisible that he can neither touch nor break through. He can't imagine her without it, that crackling fire  _is_ her. She's spent her entire life trying to keep it contained, hidden. Trying to keep it bottled up is killing her, and he may be the only one who sees it. He understands how that feels.

"Come on," he whispers, leaning close into her ear. She's tense, she still doesn't trust him. She doesn't trust  _anybody_. But curiosity overpowers her.

"Where're we going?" she asks.

Anders helps her to her feet. "We're going to be the opposite of Tranquil."

He takes her out to the coast, where the waves crash against the rocks, so loudly that they have to shout to be heard over it. The sun has finally set, leaving nothing out here but darkness, and the two of them. Hawk casts a nervous glance at Anders, and he doesn't miss the way she keeps her eyes open, her body constantly moving, alert for threats.

"Show me what you can do," he tells her.

"I can't," she insists. Her fingers clench into tight fists, and she paces the cliff that juts out over the water. She's afraid, but it's not so simple as that. He feels that same self-loathing he'd recognized in her the first time they'd ever come in contact.

"Callin,  _please_ ," he insists.

"Don't call me that," she spits back. "That's not who I am anymore!"

"Okay. Sorry. I just…"

"How do you know my name?"

Anders raises an eyebrow, holding up his hands in a defensive gesture, trying to defuse any sense of threat she might feel from him. He sits down at the edge of the cliff, staring down at the crashing waves below. And when he's sure she's listening, he answers the question. "Lirene told me. I wanted to know how you'd learned to control your magic, and she told me about your father."

"She didn't know him. Nobody did."

Anders nods, once. "You knew him," he points out.

She glares at him, afraid to talk, and he understands that. There is so much that he hasn't told her, after all. They're both damaged.

"He hated magic," she insists. "He hated the Circle, and he hated it when I turned out to be like him."

"But he taught you. He…" Anders draws in a deep breath, fighting hard against the wave of jealousy that washes over him. "He kept you safe."

"He  _didn't_."

"He tried to." How can she not see it? How can she not understand what a gift she has, what she's been given? He'd sacrificed everything for a fraction of the freedom she takes for granted.

"I brought the templars down on him!" Hawk suddenly shrieks. "I told them where he was. I  _wanted_ them to kill him, because he…" She can't finish the sentence. She breaks down into uncontrollable tears, and screams of pure rage. Anders can feel the mana surging up in her, as she calls to the primal forces that flicker just on the other side of the Veil. As Anders watches, a ball of flame erupts, quickly growing until it swallows one of the large stones that breaks the shoreline about fifty yards away.

"Firestarter," he says simply. He's repeating what he's heard. It's the first time he's ever seen it in action.

She turns away from the flame, and without her focus to keep it alive, the waves quickly douse it. "That's what you wanted, isn't it?" she spits. "You want to see what I can do?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't know."

There's still so much he doesn't know, but he doesn't want to lose her. He is so afraid of losing her. Hawk wraps her arms around her knees, shaking as the icy wind lashes at the cliff face. Anders doesn't ask any more questions about her father. He just wraps his arm around her. He lets her cry. He waits for her to pull away. She still doesn't.


	10. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So I'm an apostate now," she says softly, testing the words on her tongue. They die quickly in the silent air.  
> "Yeah, I'm… sorry."  
> The girl shrugs. Choices have been made for her for so long that this just seems like another in a long line. He gets that.

Anders doesn't notice anything out of the ordinary until he's already at the door of his clinic. He can't stop thinking about Hawk - all the things she'd said and not said before she'd pulled away from him again, the moment they returned to the city.

The familiar lamplight glows within his window, though its brightness is cut by a shield of waxed paper over the glass. It hadn't been lit when he'd left. He's  _almost_ certain. He pushes the door open carefully, holding his breath until he recognizes that the shadows he'd seen moving within the space aren't a threat. They're just kids. Kai jumps to his feet as soon as he sees Anders. "You did it!" he exclaims.

Anders can only summon up a tired smile in response. He looks past Kai to the girl he's trying to protect. She glances up nervously as soon as Anders' gaze sweeps over her. Even with Kai there hovering, she is unmistakably alone, looking fragile and tiny, curled up on a cot with her back pressed against the wall. She still wears Circle robes, torn and ill-fitting.

"I'll find you something else to wear," Anders murmurs. He moves around with aimless urgency, uncertain of what he's supposed to say. He's never seen running away from this angle before. What is she doing  _here_? "Kai..."

"I didn't know where else to bring her. Lirene said..."

"I know." Anders breathes in through his nose, slow and careful. He knew this was coming. He'd  _hoped_  this was coming. He and Cullen had traded notes, and if any of them had been intercepted there would have been a templar patrol waiting for him rather than a young girl. So why is he still so nervous?

He's halfway through digging through drawers and baskets and boxes before he realizes… "I don't have any clothes for girls." He slams the clothes trunk closed and spins around.

"That's okay. I'll just…"

"You can't wear that," he insists, nodding at the mage robes. "Here." He shoves one of his shirts at the girl. As she slips it over her head, he tries not to notice the bruises and scratches scattered over her pale skin.

She stares at him as much as she can without actually making eye contact. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do," she finally admits, her voice breaking.

Anders clears his throat awkwardly as he casts a simple warming spell on a pot of water. The girl jumps as soon as she feels the mana beginning to actively flow. Anders slowly shuts down the spell, letting the magic bleed away gradually, as he pours a cup of tea for her. "You don't have to be afraid of me," he promises.

She's so young. Too young for this life he's forced on her without even asking if she wanted it. But there's no going backward from this choice.

"So I'm an apostate now," she says softly, testing the words on her tongue. They die quickly in the silent air.

"Yeah, I'm… sorry."

The girl shrugs. Choices have been made for her for so long that this just seems like another in a long line. He gets that.

She ignores the mug of tea he's put in front of her, but Anders won't try to force her to drink it. Instead, he begins packing up the kind of food that will last a while, enough to sustain her wherever she goes from here. Where is she supposed to go from here? He doesn't think things through. He never has.

"What's your name?" he finally asks, because talking gives him something to do.

"Arleigh," the girl replies, after a long moment. Her voice hasn't gotten any louder than the rough whisper she started with. She only answers direct questions.

Anders' stomach hurts, his whole body sings with primal fear, a recognition of a kindred spirit. How old is she? Twelve? Thirteen? He sighs. "Did you… want out?" he asks carefully. Arleigh shrugs. Anders recognizes a nonverbal deflection when he sees one. Or maybe she really isn't sure. He understands that too. "You don't have to lie to me," he tells her gently. "You can tell me what really happened to you."

"I don't really feel like talking about it," she mutters. "No offense."

Anders nods. "I understand," he says simply.

He knows plenty of people who  _say_ that, but he means it, and Arleigh relaxes slightly as she lets herself believe the truth of his words. Her hands wrap around the still-warm mug full of tea, though she still doesn't drink it. She glances up, frowning at Anders, trying to figure out if she can trust him, and how much. Her dark brown eyes seem to pierce through him, reading him as easily as an open book. "Anyway, you already know what happened, don't you."

"Not your specific details. I know enough."

Arleigh nods again. It's amazing how much she can say without making eye contact. "You were there, weren't you?"

"Not the Gallows. But yes, I've been where you are." He pulls up the sleeve of his shirt to show her the phylactery scar, and she nods in immediate recognition.

"I wasn't trying to escape," she insists. "I didn't want to. I don't know… I mean… why me? It's not  _fair_."

"You were the one we could get to," Anders replies honestly.

"So what, it was just… random luck?"

"No. It wasn't." Kai's voice breaks through the quiet little bubble between Anders and Arleigh. His sudden presence sends Arleigh into a violent and reactive fight or flight mode. Anders can feel her magic spiking, and he lashes out instinctively, pulling her power into himself. They both are breathing heavily, and Arleigh's hands are clenched into tight fists. He's taken away her ability to fight with magic, so she fights physically. But she's a twelve-year-old girl, taught repeatedly and effectively that she doesn't have the right to fight back, not without permission. As soon as Anders wraps his arms around her, she stops struggling. Her breathing still comes in sporadic, choking gasps.

"I'm sorry," he croons gently. The mana drain has left Arleigh weak and shaken. And somehow he has to convince her that she's still safe with him.

Kai lets the door to the clinic slam shut behind him as he steps inside. He watches Arleigh's reaction with wide eyes. He's clearly in over his head. He shuffles his feet, and ducks his head. His eyes flicker to Anders. "She's okay, isn't she?" he whines.

Arleigh pulls herself out of Anders' arms. "I'm fine," she snaps. Kai licks his lips, and nods, accepting her words even if he clearly doesn't believe them. Arleigh looks him up and down, wrapping her arms tightly around herself. "So you're the one who… what? Rescued me."

"I didn't know what else to do!"

"I never asked for help."

"Yes, you did," Kai insists. "You  _did_."

Arleigh doesn't say anything else. She doesn't confirm or deny Kai's self-congratulatory heroism. She doesn't thank him, either of them. She looks terrified. "What happens now?" she finally asks.

Kai, who is  _also_ just a child, casts a glance at Anders.

"I'll find you somewhere safe to go," Anders replies immediately. "I promise, Arleigh."

"Okay," she replies. She doesn't sound as if she believes him. But what else is there?

Anders quickly packs a bag with as many of his old clothes as he can fit, and as much food as he can part with. He shoves the sack into the girl's hands, knowing that the sooner she untangles herself from him, the better it will be, for both of them. The note hidden inside the pile of clothes he'd given her will steer her to safety. If he can trust Cullen, anyway. He has no idea what the scribbled message says. If he doesn't know where she is he can't accidentally give her location away. In the future, he knows, it's better if he stays out of these kinds of rescue missions completely.

Arleigh slips the bag over her shoulder and doesn't look back.

Anders doesn't follow her. He can't let himself get caught up in her, where she goes, what she does. She could go back to the Gallows, if that's her choice. It has to be her choice that matters.

He holds his breath and drums his fingers against the wall just inside the door.

After a minute that seems to stretch into eternity, he sits down. Collapses, more like. The enormity of what he's just done has finally caught up to him. He's thinking about a future full of rescue missions, and the image fits so easily in his head.

"So I still don't get to see her?" Kai asks. The boy watches Anders warily from another unused cot.

"She's not safe here, Kai." This is good. Reminding himself of the dangers, the  _reality_ of the situation, that's what he needs to do. This was a one time thing. It does not signal a trend. He's smarter than that. He has to be.

"That's not  _fair_!" Kai protests. "That's what they said before!"

Anders frowns, too tired and conflicted to know how to navigate a childish tantrum. "Before?" he repeats, still confused. Kai seems far away, unrelated to the emotional turbulence Anders struggles to navigate. He'd gotten  _out_. How can the Circle still manage to claw at him? How is he  _still_ being drawn back, even when no one is hunting him?

"When the templars came," the boy clarifies. "They said they had to take her away so she'd be safe. She's not  _dangerous_."

"Maybe," Anders hedges. "But she is in danger. She can't stay here. You have to know that."

"Yeah. I know that."

Anders sighs. The kid is putting on a brave front, but he's not a good liar. And Anders hasn't ever been good at disregarding other people's problems. Maybe it's only because they serve as a welcome distraction from his own issues. Whatever the reason, he can't ever seem to stop himself from meddling, from trying to  _fix._

"You… really like her, don't you?" he asks easily. He pulls a small wrinkled apple from a nearby crate and tosses it to Kai. "She's more than just a friend."

The kid nods. "I've known her forever. Since we were little. She was the only friend I ever had."

The boy waits for a long moment, holding his breath, holding Anders' gaze. But Anders can't give him what he wants. They're not friends. Anders can't afford to have any more friends.

After a moment, Kai seems to understand the rejection. He leaves Anders alone, and the healer tries to tell himself that it's for the best, that this is what he wanted.

In truth, the clinic feels too quiet now, with Kai and Arleigh both gone. Anders still feels responsible for them, both of them, but especially the mage girl. On the run for the rest of her life, because he hadn't given her any other choice. And he's possibly the only one in the entire world who knows exactly what kind of life he's doomed her to.

He forces himself to lay still on his cot, although sleep is out of the question. He stares up at the dark ceiling, feeling time slide away. He finally rolls onto his stomach, allowing him to reach under his bed and pull out a stack of loose parchment and a bit of charcoal. He blows off the worst of the dust. He lets the worst of his own memories and his fears of Arleigh's truth carry his fingers over the paper. He presses down hard lines, shades in black shadows and piercing bright lights. Children cowering in darkened cells, the enchanted antimagic shackles locked so tightly around their wrists that they left behind blood and weeping blisters, the grief of mothers and the wordless terror of the children pulled from their arms. Tally lines carved into stone walls or wooden bunks. Enforced silence. Empty prayers.

Untold hours pass as Anders tries to make people  _see_ , the only way he knows how. Nobody's ever listened before, but somehow it feels different now. Somehow it seems both possible and necessary for him to make them hear. His desperation is overwhelmingly loud in the empty room, as he scribbles together fragmented sentences and garbled pleas. He'll fix it all later. He just has to get the words down before he loses them.

He nearly jumps out of his skin at the sound of a loud pounding on the door. He curses himself for not paying enough attention, then reminds himself that templars wouldn't knock. He jumps up, crinkling small mountains of paper and tangled bedsheets as he does. "Be right there!" he yells. He curses again as he trips over one of the clinic cots that stands between him and the entrance to his hovel. His shin throbs with residual pain, and he limps slightly as he yanks open the door.

"I brought you some food," Lirene announces proudly, holding out a bowl.

"It looks good. Smells good."

"You don't have to act so surprised."

"I'm not. I'm… what're you doing here?"

"Just came to talk," Lirene promises.

She sets out a couple of chairs and sets the bowl full of soup in front of Anders. He runs his spoon through it, and then takes a sip. The steam wafts into his face, warming him from the outside in. He closes his eyes and breathes it in: onions, broth, spices… "Did you get a real chicken from somewhere?"

"Just eat."

He does, knowing that it'll be easier just to do what she says than listen to her badgering him into finally following her friendly orders. Lirene is stubbornly kind, taking care of everyone around her whether they want her to or not.

"Hey, what's this?"

Anders looks up, feeling his stomach constrict as he recognizes what Lirene is looking at. Why hadn't he hidden those drawings? Or burned them. Nobody's supposed to see that stuff; it's so raw and broken.  _He's_  raw and broken.

"Nothing."

"Did you draw these? … Anders, they're really good."

He shakes his head. What is she talking about? Why doesn't she understand? Doesn't she  _see_?

Lirene recognizes his discomfort, of course she does. She takes care of people, every waking moment. "Anders, come here."

It's a soft invitation, but Anders feels himself drawn toward it, pulled in by the promise of someone who might care. He isn't alone anymore. He sits down on his bed, next to her, close enough to touch, although they don't. Lirene smooths down a flat space in the blankets, and she spreads his drawings out,  _showing_ him the things he's committed to paper. There are words too, but those aren't as clear. Not yet.

"Is this what happened to you?" Lirene asks. Her voice is a choked whisper in the flickering candlelight. Her fingers skim over charcoal lines, deep pools of darkness that he can never forget or outrun. Anders looks up, looking at Lirene instead. She is real and solid, and he can hold on to that.

"Not just me," he hedges, a breathless admission that is the closest thing to a confession he can give her.

Lirene closes her eyes. Her fingernail flicks at a bright white Chantry sun that takes up most of one piece of paper. She taps a sporadic rhythm, then opens her eyes again. Anders swears he can actually feel the breath that she's holding. There's something inside him that wants to reach out, but that urge is buried deep; it feels dangerous. He folds his fingers into a loose fist instead, and tucks his hair behind his ear with his free hand. He watches her, waiting. They sit together in the silence of a held breath, but Anders has never been especially good at sitting still. Lirene stirs when he does, although her fingers still remain clenched tightly around the paper in her hand, half-crumpled into a ball.

"Everyone around me just… tried to pretend she'd died. But worse than that. Like she'd never existed at all. And here I am, with this… hole. This emptiness inside that I'm not even allowed to talk about."

"Your… daughter?" He's guessing, but there's something broken in her that reaches something in him. He barely remembers his mother, but that empty hole hasn't gone away, not from Lirene's life and not from his either. "Your daughter's a mage?"

She nods. "Mira."

Anders stomach flips. "I… knew her," he chokes out, carefully. He could lie. How would she know? He doesn't want to tell the truth. Not when he sees the spark of hope flickering in Lirene's eyes. How can he be the one to kill that?

"What happened to her? Tell me. Tell me the truth."

"I… can't." he insists. He's begging her not to push it, he doesn't want to.

" _Please_ , Anders. I have to know."

Anders closes his eyes again, struggling to breathe. He doesn't look at Lirene as he talks. He looks at the drawings instead. The stained glass windows of the chapel, the rough waves of the lake crashing against the tower's rocky shore. "They made you a promise they had no intention of keeping," he insists. He doesn't even try to hide the bitterness from his tone. "They told you they'd keep your child safe. Teach her. That she'd grow up to be somebody." He knows all of this, he's pieced together the story from a dozen conversations scattered over the years. It started in Amaranthine, when he realized that there were people out there who  _did_ care what happened to mages, even if they had to hide their caring. He saw another side of it then. It wasn't enough to change him, yet, but it had planted a seed.

He locks eyes with Lirene, takes a deep breath. "Is that why you're doing this? Helping me?" Motivations matter. And maybe he can stall. Maybe she won't make him be the bearer of the worst news there is.

"I'm helping people because people need help." Lirene replies immediately. She is still locked onto the topic at hand. Of course she is. It's her  _daughter_.

"She's dead," Anders spits. He tries to tell her gently, but he can barely choke the words out, so it comes out sounding harsh and angry. He expects Lirene to flinch, or retaliate, but she just sits, still as a statue. Something flickers across her face, a held-in grief. But she doesn't look surprised. "She did it herself. I mean, there's that, I guess." It hurts how easy it is to talk about suicide. He can't look at Lirene while he does it, and he's not sure anymore if he's talking about a girl he'd barely known, or himself. "It happened a lot. More than anyone ever wants to admit."

Lirene nods. She's not looking at him either. Anders knows enough to recognize the way she pulls away, struggling to process everything he's just told her. It's like a part of her has shut down. She flips through his drawings, determined, single-mindedly focused. She studies them carefully, every detail. She takes it all in and says nothing.

"People should know," she finally declares.

"What?" Anders had lost track of the conversation. But Lirene locks eyes with him, and it's like she'd never missed a beat.

"It's not fair that they get away with this. It's not fair that no one knows the truth." Anders holds his breath. She's right, of course she is, but he's been screaming into the silence for as long as he's been alive, and the world has never been fair before.

"Was she right, do you think?" Lirene finally asks. "That death was her best option?"

"I don't know," Anders replies honestly.

"Maker," Lirene breathes. It's just an expression, but it startles him all the same. It's the first time he's heard her make even a token reference to faith of any kind. Maybe it's just something you say when you don't know what else to say. But maybe it's a plea for help. He latches onto it.

"Do you believe in it?" he presses,  _caring_ for some reason he can't pinpoint. It doesn't matter if her answer is yes or no, but it suddenly seems to matter, and matter a lot, that she  _has_ an answer. "Any of it? The Chantry?"

She shrugs. "I don't know, maybe. It's a hard habit to shake."

"Yeah. I know what you mean." She's just as confused as he is. She's been just as disappointed, just as damaged. She's lost just as much. They have something in common. Somehow he'd always figured that mages had to be different, that because they'd been torn away from the world of regular people, their suffering and brokenness would be different too, somehow. On a different scale. But Lirene hurts too, and her pain feels exactly the same as his.

Slowly, carefully, he gathers up the drawings she's been fixating on. In deference to her earlier suggestion, that other people should see them, he tucks them away inside a hidden drawer rather than just lighting them on fire the way he usually would. "You get her out of here?" he finally asks. He doesn't say Arleigh's name, both in the interests of paranoia and security, and because it provides some needed distance between him and the consequences of his actions. Lirene knows exactly who he means anyway.

She holds his gaze for a long moment, then shakes her head. "She didn't want to go."

"The hell do you mean, she didn't want to go?"

"She's got family here, Anders, she grew up here. She's not like us."

Panic seizes, tight fingers squeezing around his heart, making it hard to breathe. His eyes squeeze shut as he tries to fight the pain behind his skull.

"Hey," Lirene grabs his wrist, feeling his pulse fluttering under his skin. "Calm down." Her fingers run through his tangled hair, helping to center him. He sighs, and reaches out for his stash of vials, searching for something that'll help him stay calm think straight… Lirene closes her fingers overtop of his, wrestling him away from the drugs. "What in the Void do you think you're doing?" she hisses.

"She'll get killed," he mumbles, incoherently. "She doesn't know… she doesn't know anything! I have to find her!"

"She knows how to hide, Anders," Lirene soothes. "She won't waste the chance you've given her."

"She's just a kid."

"How old was Mira?" Lirene replies steadily. Anders stares at her, mouth agape. How could she use her own daughter as a weapon like that, as an argument? But damn it, it's an effective one. He settles, leaning his head back against the rough splintered wood of the clinic's makeshift wall. How old was Mira? Fifteen and staring down a life without a future, with nothing but memories of a life where nobody wanted her.

The aching in his gut doesn't go away. He  _knows_  Lirene, he trusts her, but it's hard now not to look at her and see another mother who did nothing to protect her child from the Chantry's oppression. No wonder then, that she would do  _this_ , to try to make up for what she's lost. His jaw drops open. "She's with you."

Lirene does not confirm or deny his realization. She doesn't have to. "Do you want me to go?" she asks. He shakes his head, even though he thinks that might be exactly what he wants. He can't even summon up the energy to tell her how dangerous it is, this thing she's doing. She already knows. She's been putting herself in the line of fire to help others in need for a long time. Decades. And in her mind, adopting a Gallows runaway is no different from everything she's already done. Lirene pats his arm, and gives him a tired smile. "Thank you," she says softly. "For telling me the truth."


	11. Underground

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She won't stop him; she won't let him stop. It does not feel dangerous; it heals things that have been hidden for so long she'd forgotten they were wrong.

Hawk's fingers scrabble over the moss-covered stone. Trickles of water echo through the darkness, warped and distorted so that it's impossible to tell where it's coming from. "Are you coming?" she asks softly.

"Yeah," Anders murmurs. He follows in her footsteps, trusting in her expertise to carry them through the twisting passageways of Darktown's sewers. He licks his lips and probes outward with his magic, daring to risk calling a wisp of light into being. It dances around their heads, twisting strands of bluish-green illumination through the air, pulling at Hawk's hair with a crackle of gentle electricity.

"They'll know we're coming."

Anders shrugs. "Does that matter now?"

The drips splash through the silence. Anders takes a careful breath, and plunges forward. His footsteps are loud and hurried.

"Stop breathing down the back of my neck!" Hawk demands.

"Sorry," he mutters. "Can't help it."

"This was your idea," she reminds him.

"And your lead."

"And if I'd known you be so loud and jumpy, I'd never have told you about it!"

"Sorry," he says again.

Their voices ring through the space that is somehow both cavernous and narrow; it reminds Anders of the Deep Roads. But their childish argument and the light of the wisps still spinning and trailing through the darkness help. Hawk's presence helps too. His heart rate slows and his breathing gets calmer.

There is a sudden spike of pain, a sensation of absolute wrongness, that steals his breath away. He trips, landing on his knees in the shit of the sewer.

"Anders."

"Don't you feel it?" he pleads.

"There's people nearby," Hawk agrees. Her voice sounds strained, and he can feel that she too is struggling to push through whatever corrupting influence it is that permeates this space.

Anders cannot contain his panic. The dancing lights that hover at the edge of the Veil are no longer tied to his control. They've spun away, and he knows that they'll dissolve into nothingness before they get too far from him, but still, it unnerves him to have lost them. "Did you see… can you see?" he asks Hawk, carefully.

She shrugs, and helps him to his feet, wrinkling her nose. "Well enough. Anyway, there's no hiding now." The prospect of an imminent fight seems to excite her.

Anders struggles to gain control of his warring instincts: fear and anger that send conflicting messages and leave him dangerously paralyzed. Hawk has no such ingrained fear. She glances backward at him only once before slipping like a shadow into the open pool of wastewater gathering under the city. There is space enough here to fight, or to meet; or to spring a trap. Voices of panic and pain pull at him, from both sides of the Veil.

"Leave me alone!" someone shouts. The unfamiliar voice echoes off the stone, warped by the water. Anders frowns, trying to make sense of the scene before him: there are five people, four men and a woman, all of them young, clustered at the edge of the pool. One of the men is struggling feebly against the leader of this small gang, who holds him close to his large chest and holds a knife to his throat.

"Don't hurt him," someone else says. The second voice is more hesitant. Anders can barely hear it.

The gang leader laughs, and a scream suddenly rings through the cavern. The knife is no longer across the young man's throat, but a deep gash runs down the whole of his arm. His skin peels away from the muscle beneath, and blood pours, thick and dark, from the wound. Anders fights the overwhelming urge to be sick as the darkness he'd felt hovering at the edge of the Veil coalesces into physical form. A demon roars to life, towering over the small group. It lets out a mad cackling sound as it twists and contorts, still growing. "Thank you," it grates out. Its voice sounds like nothing more than rocks scraping against one another, raw and painful.

The knife clatters to the ground as the demon attacks. The boy whose blood had brought forth the demon struggles to scramble backward, out of the path of danger, but the woman who had been waiting on the edge of the gang's loose circle grabs him. She has her own knife. They all do, Anders recognizes now. They're simple things, the kind used for butchering animals, the sort of everyday tools that are available everywhere, from the market in Lowtown to a housewife's kitchen. But they can do plenty of damage.

And the woman draws hers across the boy's throat, finishing the job her companion could not. The boy is still alive, though not for long. His muscles flail without control. Blood burbles from his throat, and there is a sickening choking wheeze. The woman pushes him forward, and there is nowhere to go but down.

There is a loud splash as his body disappears into the water below them. The demon laughs again.

The gang leader whirls around. Doing so exposes his back to both the demon and Hawk, but in his rage, he isn't thinking straight. "What are you doing, Evelina, you bitch?!" he hisses. "We could've used him."

"Fuck you!" Hawk spits. Anders flinches. He'd lost sight of her, for a moment, but now there's no ignoring the danger she's in. Her knife slides easily through the layers of cloth that are all the protection the gang leader has, drawing sticky red blood from his belly.

She is outnumbered. They are all outmatched. The demon continues to laugh, delighting in its presence here on this plane. It grows more solid, fueled by the chaos and carnage. It gathers its power indiscriminately, aiming for the humans nearest it without regard for their loyalties or factions. It reaches out with movements that aren't anything like a person's. It grabs and rips and tears, and screams echo through the underground cavern. Limbs are ripped from limbs, and bodies fall to the rocky ground, twisted into grotesque contortions.

"Hawk!" Anders yells.

He cannot protect her. He is paralyzed with indecision as the demon whirls around to confront her, but she's already moving. At least until the demon pauses. It ends its frenetic massacre seemingly as quickly as it had started, and focuses its attention instead on Hawk. It reaches out for her with undisguised avarice, and something approaching a grin, warped and twisted, appears on its mangled face.

"Hawk!" Anders screams again. Memories claw at him; nothing solid, but sensations he hasn't felt since his Harrowing suddenly come rushing back, full force. It's enough to get the demon's attention, to make it split its focus rather than honing in solely on Hawk.

"Healer." The demon recognizes Anders. It greets him like a friend.

Anders grins too, flooded with new confidence. "Come and get me, you bastard."

He holds his ground. He isn't scared. The demon glides toward him, surprisingly smoothly, and lashes at him with tight coils of flame that surge out from its center. Anders dodges the initial blow, his heart racing, but the demon is made of fire, and there is no avoiding all of it. One of the flames licks at him, and pain surges up Anders' leg where the rope-like tendril had grabbed hold of him. Anders tries to kick the demon away, but there is almost nothing solid to connect with. It isn't like fighting a person. "Fuck you," he spits.

The demon laughs again.

Another blast of fire washes over Anders, this time catching the right side of his body full on. Blinding tears pour from his eyes and breathing becomes a near impossibility. He falls awkwardly and tries to smother the flames against the rocky ground. He isn't sure if he's successful, but if the fire is still burning, at least he can't feel it. He lies there, moaning and shaking with shock. The demon advances, and Anders can do nothing but stare at it, dazed and helpless.

"Anders, run!" Hawk yells, and as he watches she ducks in under the demon's reach and hits him with a blow of her own, an invisible wave of kinetic force that pushes the demon temporarily back. "Run!" she yells again. She can't keep her attention on him long enough to see if he does, not if she has to fight off the demon at the same time. Anders knows that. Lying here is only going to get them both killed. He grits his teeth against the pain and sends a surge of healing energy through his body, enough to get him to his feet. Running is still impossible, but he manages to hobble back toward the narrow crevices that led them here.

"Magelings," he hears the demon say. "You called me here."

"Fuck! You!" Hawk yells. She punctuates her curses with more magical attacks, sharp blasts of energy that splash across the demon's fiery skin, melting it away like acid. The demon howls in agony, and retaliates with a wall of fire that encircles Hawk, trapping her close to it. She holds her ground, pulling her daggers out of their sheath, though it seems unlikely that they will do much against a being who is not capable of bleeding. "You killed the ones who called you here!" she screams, as she stabs into the demon's leg, the rocky armor that protects the physical form within the flames. She doesn't even seem to notice the fire that envelops her.

Behind the flickering wall of flame, Anders leans heavily against one of the larger stones at the edge of the cavern. He takes a deep breath, and lets loose all of the mana he can manage to summon. He doesn't bother with finesse, forming only a loose image of what he needs. A gust of wind blows against the demon's fiery body, freezing into ice as it comes into contact with that unnatural flame. The demon shrieks, scrabbling and fighting with furious desperate zeal before it explodes into a thousand frozen shards.

Anders and Hawk are left alone, in sudden silence. Anders takes a few more ragged breaths. Around them, the underground caverns echo with the sounds of faraway water dripping in unpredictable rhythms. "Are you okay?" he finally asks Hawk.

She wipes her face quickly with the back of her hand, and nods, although she moves gingerly and her breathing comes in shaky gasps. She looks around at the aftermath of the battle. Frozen ichor still litters the ground. There are two recognizable human bodies visible in the carnage. Both are male. Hawk stares at them dispassionately and starts cleaning one of her knives, scraping it along the bottom of her shirt. "Did he kill all of them?" Hawk asks. "Did you see?"

Anders shakes his head. He didn't see. He doesn't know. How is she so steady? Everything inside of him is screaming that this is not okay.

"They were mages," he whispers.

Hawk shrugs. "They doesn't necessarily make them good guys."

"Still…" He looks up again, noticing this time how pale she is. She is terrified. She may have been hiding it well before now, in the adrenaline rush of the fight, but now that it's over…

"I'm fucked," she sighs.

"Hawk…"

"Don't you know who that was?" When Anders simply looks blank, she takes a few steps forward toward the edge of the rock shelf that forms the boundary of the underground cavern. She cannot seem to tear her eyes away from the shallow pool of wastewater that collects at the base of that ledge. As though if she stares into it for long enough, she can somehow go back in time and rescue the corpse that hides there. She spits into the water, and paces back and forth. "It was Seamus fucking Dumar," she insists. "The Viscount's son."

Anders head snaps up as the weight of what that will mean to them hits home, and steals his breath away. "Blood mages killed the Viscount's son," he repeats, sounding dazed.

Hawk nods.

Anders tries, desperately, to come up with a reason. What were they trying to do? Did they know that their actions would call forth a demon? Was that the goal, or simply an unfortunate side effect? "That woman," he remembers aloud. "She said they could use him. I don't think she meant for him to die."

"It doesn't exactly matter now, does it?" Hawk reaches out for the nearest dead blood mage. She drags the heavy corpse over to the ledge, until all she has to do is kick it over and let gravity take care of the rest of the work. Anders reaches out to stop her as she moves toward the second body, but she pushes him away. "We have to," she insists.

It's not the first time she's disposed of a body. Darktown claims its blood toll, whether or not she helps the city along. "Sometimes shit happens," she says simply. As philosophies go, it's not especially deep, but it is accurate. Anders sighs. "Come on. We have to go." She starts to walk, not caring if he's following her. She never signed on for this. She never wanted this. This has become a crime she won't be able to hide from. She will be guilty by association. She should run. What's in Kirkwall, anyway, that's worth staying for?

She scrambles through the underground trails, navigating by instinct more than anything.

"Hawk, wait!" Anders yells, chasing after her.

She whirls around, still unable to keep still. Why does he keep trying to talk to her? "You can't hide from anyone who's really looking for you," she reminds him. And they will all be looking for him now. For both of them. "Darktown… rumors and whispers are its blood. You know that." There won't be any hiding this. Not for long.

Anders nods, thinking without saying anything that maybe that can work to his advantage. "I've got a few tricks of my own," he tells her. He hasn't had to actively avoid templars for years, but it's not the kind of thing you forget. But Hawk doesn't seem placated.

"This isn't like Ferelden, they don't just stay hidden in a tower here, they're…" She stops talking, twists away from Anders, tries to think. "They're looking for us."

And she can't trust that Darktown can keep her hidden anymore. She can't trust her survival to anyone else. She has to fight. And she needs Anders to understand that.

"I know," Anders rumbles.

Hawk knows that the fear in his eyes is reflected in her own. "They're looking for blood mages," she ventures, tentatively. As though that could save them. It is one last ditch effort to pretend that she could still find any kind of real safety in this town.

Anders snorts, breaking through the fragile illusion before it's even fully formed. "Do you think blood mages look different? Do you think they are different?"

"They are different," Hawk mutters.

But she's killed people too, with and without magic. What makes her better?

Anders doesn't reply. He'd always told himself blood magic was the one line he would never cross. He'd needed that: a hard boundary, enforced from within rather than without. But the closest friend he'd ever had crossed that line alone, because he wasn't there when she needed him. He's come up with a thousand plausible reasons for leaving Amaranthine, but the one that still aches in his gut, even after years, is the fear that he'd never be able to repair the break that blood had ripped between him and Rhyanon Amell.

And now there's someone else who needs him. He can't abandon Hawk. He won't. He made that mistake once already and he refuses to let it happen again. He squeezes her shoulder, more firmly now, letting her know that he isn't going anywhere. They are back to holding onto one another, needing one another.

Hawk has already given up pretending that doesn't want the comfort of his touch. And Anders has stopped trying to stop himself from giving into his desire for her. It's easier to face the future and confront the terror of the recent past when they don't have to do it alone.

This time when Anders returns to the clinic, Hawk joins him. They don't talk about it, but neither one of them seem surprised when it happens. As the sun rises over the city, they indulge in one another, with desperate, furious passion. She falls into his arms, fitting like she belongs there. Like it has always been natural.

She shivers under his touch, aching with want. His thumb traces the curve of her cheek, stopping over her lips. He presses down gently, and she opens her mouth to breathe. She just manages to draw in a gasping inhalation before he covers her lips with his own. His kiss is sweet and forceful; he no longer holds himself back. Neither of them do. She explores the planes of his body with curious hands. Her fingers lock into his hair, stopping him from pulling away. Even when they no longer have enough air, when he has to break away, it is only far enough to look into her eyes. His golden brown eyes are both haunted and alive. She flinches away from the intensity in them, suddenly shy and uncertain.

"I've wanted this for so long," Anders admits.

Hawk nods. Yes, she knows. Yes, she wants it too. She won't stop him; she won't let him stop. This time, when she feels the touch of his mana, she doesn't push it away. She invites him in. His magic is sweeter than her own, and brighter. It does not feel dangerous; it heals things that have been hidden for so long she'd forgotten they were wrong.

His kisses leave her lips and trail down her neck. With a gentle hand, he reaches under her loose-fitting shirt and cradles the fullness of her breast. His fingers are cold, and her skin prickles with goosebumps in the wake of his touch, but the sensation only stirs a fire in her loins. While she was distracted, Anders apparently managed to wriggle out of his pants, just enough. He isn't patient enough to lose them completely, and neither is she.

She laughs as he teases her, lighting up sparks of electricity between his fingers, letting them dance along her skin, until the subtle balance of pleasure and pain leaves her gasping for breath with tears in her eyes. Anders' eyes sparkle and he grins, kissing her again. His lips are surprisingly soft and gentle. She lets her eyes drift closed as he takes his time with her, exploring with a careful slowness. She listens to the stutter of his breathing. "Anders?" she murmurs, rolling over to let him trace the curve of her spine. He brushes his lips across her temple in response.

"I've never done this before," he admits. She frowns, sitting up and wrapping a threadbare sheet around her. Anders locks eyes with her, sighing deeply. They are in this fight together now but she can't know what she's given him. He's never told her. She's never asked. "In the Circle," he admits. "Sex was… not exactly forbidden. But there was no place for love. We shagged quickly, in hidden corners, you barely even looked at the other person. Never spoke. The threat of punishment was always hanging over your head, or worse, the knowledge that you could be separated, permanently, if there was anything real, if it was discovered…"

"So you had sex with me… what? To prove you could?"

"Is that so wrong?"

She shakes her head, as he holds her close, idly combing through her hair with his fingers. She can feel the motion of his chest, rising and falling with each breath. His heartbeat thrums with steady certainty. She shakes her head. "No," she demands. "It isn't wrong."


	12. Desperate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Make no mistake," the Knight Commander hisses. "You tread a dangerously narrow path. And so does the healer you're so desperate to protect."
> 
> So that's what she wants then. The leash she dangles is short enough to choke. It's no better than Athenril. But there is no other play. "Fine, I'll do it. I'll be your attack dog."

The gray light of morning gives way to the piercing brightness of noon. Anders rolls over and blinks his eyes open. He's immediately aware of Hawk's presence, the warmth of her body pressed up against his side, where she had fallen asleep. He's surprised at the intensity of his relief. She's still there, snoring softly, curled up beneath the pile of thin blankets. She stirs, and blinks her eyes open, as though aware that he is watching her. Maybe she is. An unfamiliar heat floods Anders' belly, an uncertain sense of where the limits are. In the light of morning, everything that had seemed simple in the dark of night suddenly  _isn't_. Waking up with a girl in his bed is still a new thing for him.

Hawk seems to sense his discomfort. Or maybe she's just got enough of her own. She pulls away from him as she wakes up, and she taps her leg up and down, drums her fingers on the edge of the bed, scans the room for threats that aren't there. She jumps when Anders puts his hand gently on her arm. She yanks her arm away, and retreats as far away from him as the small mattress will allow. She curls up, arms wrapped tightly around her knees, and Anders knows better than to force his way through the walls she's putting up.

She grabs her clothes while he's still watching, and begins pulling on her shirt, her pants. She's still soaked with drying sweat, her hair is a tangled mess. They were crawling around in the sewers last night.

"I have to go," she finally manages to say.

She waits for Anders to protest, or tell her to wait, but he doesn't say anything at all. He simply nods, and sinks back down onto the cot, shivering slightly as Hawk pushes open the door, letting in a sharp gust of wind. She glances back once more, before the door slams shut completely, but she won't let herself go back inside. No matter how desperately she wants to. There is something else she has to do. A report she has to give.

She speeds through the city, navigating as quickly as she can, until she gets to the wide and sparkling streets of Hightown and pushes her way into the Guard barracks. She's too exhausted to make much of an effort to hide, or come up with an excuse for her presence here. She sits down on a low bench designed for the purpose, and her eyes drift closed. All the memories of the previous night rush back at her. With Anders, she'd been able to avoid it, to pretend it hadn't happened. But Anders isn't here now. She's all alone, and she has to face it.

She hears snatches of the guards' conversations, enough to know they're talking about her, and within minutes Aveline turns up in the hall. She takes in Hawk's appearance with wide-eyed panic, then pulls her into the Guard Captain's office. "Sit down," she orders. Hawk does. Aveline has a couple of chairs set up opposite her desk, for interviews or soft interrogations. It's not the first time Hawk's been there. Usually, she's smarter about reserving information, or bartering for a more beneficial trade. This time, she's barely alert enough to track the guardswoman's nervous pacing across the room.

"I found the Viscount's son," Hawk manages to whisper. Her throat is dry and her thoughts are racing, and she does little to hide the fear she feels. Her life is spinning out of control. Everything she's tried to run away from, or keep contained, is catching up and spilling over now.

She shakes her head before Aveline can even finish uttering the obvious question. There is no false hope. Seamus Dumar is dead. Aveline sighs, and sits down heavily on the edge of her desk. "Tell me what happened," she demands. Hawk starts to, but then Aveline holds up a hand. "Wait. Come on. We'll have to report it to the Viscount."

"I  _can't_ ," Hawk tries to plead, but Aveline reminds her that she's the only one who was there. Her words will have much more meaning than anything that comes secondhand.

"He might even believe you," she insists. "Don't worry, Hawk. I won't let anything happen to you."

"I don't need your protection," Hawk mutters. But that's far from the truth, and they both know it.

The soldiers positioned around the Viscount's Keep want nothing to do with them, but Aveline presses her way through the gauntlet with the stubbornness that let her rise so quickly through the ranks of the Guard. By the time they make it into the Viscount's personal quarters, he is waiting for them, standing watch at a balcony at the top of a wide marble staircase.

"Who is this?"

He makes no effort to hide the disgust in his voice as he takes one look at Hawk and makes all kinds of - mostly correct - assumptions about who and what she is. Aveline doesn't crumble before him either, though. "She brings word of your son, Ser," she says calmly. And then she steps aside, pushing Hawk forward.

Hawk has very little patience for diplomacy, and little experience with the nobility except for what it takes to scheme, fleece, and steal from them. And she wants to get out of here as fast as possible. "He's dead, Ser," she says bluntly. "I am… sorry," she adds after a moment. She's guessing at what protocol demands, but it seems as though she should add some kind of sentiment. She can't tell if the apology brings any relief to the Viscount though. He white-knuckles the balcony railing, staying completely still as Hawk fills in the silence with a halting report of what she'd seen in the sewers the previous night.

She keeps Anders out of it, and doesn't mention her own use of magic during the fight. Although she doesn't hide the fact that she knew the Darktown passages and went into them expecting a gang war, she highlights the fact that Aveline had led her to believe that the Coterie was the most likely culprit in Seamus' disappearance. She hadn't been expecting to encounter maleficar, or demons. No one could have been prepared for that.

Silence reigns for long moments after she finishes.

"How could this have happened?" Marlowe Dumar cries suddenly. His grief desperately pierces the quiet. His shoulders shake as he sobs, openly. In this moment, he is not the leader of a city, or Aveline's superior officer. He is just a man, and one who has lost his only son. He lets go of the balcony, and begins to walk slowly, nodding toward Hawk, inviting her to follow him. "I knew Seamus was mixed up with dangerous people," he says as he paces the long, carpeted hallway. "I  _warned_ him."

"Ser…" Aveline begins, but Dumar whirls around and unleashes all of his rage and blame on the Guardswoman.

"Hold your tongue! If you had done your job instead of pawning it off on this sewer rat, Seamus might still be alive."

"Nothing could have prevented this!" Hawk insists. She doesn't care that he's insulted her. She just cares that he knows what really happened. "This wasn't… he trusted them," she says softly. "He followed them, willingly. He thought they were friends."

Pure hatred wells up in her. Old memories. She thought she'd remembered what blood magic felt like, but she hadn't, not really. Not until she felt it all over again, when those skinny, wild-eyed mages in the sewers used Seamus' blood to rip open the Veil. "They used him. He was naive, maybe. Innocent. But it wasn't his fault."

"Where were the templars?" Dumar spits. "How could such a thing have gone unnoticed?" It's a damned good question.

Hawk shrugs, letting his pacing pull him away from her. Her part in in this is over. It has to be. "That's your job, Ser," she says simply, as he reaches the end of the hallway. "It isn't mine."

She knows even as she says it that it's planting a dangerous seed. But she hates blood magic too. Dumar is right. If the templars had been doing their job, this never could have happened. She doesn't give a shit about Hightown's nobility, but the evil of blood magic corrupts everything it touches. It has poisoned her since she was a child. Since the man she trusted to keep her safe made her hold out her arm for his knife and told her not to cry. "Fuck you," she snarls, under her breath, as she makes her way back to the alienage, still the only home she has.

She tells herself that it feels good to get out on the streets, where she doesn't feel so caged in. She's aware that people must be watching her, but after years of working her way up the ranks of Athenril's gang, most of the residents of Darktown steer clear of her. She chews on her lower lip as she slowly makes her way up to the docks, where it'll be easy enough to distract the dockmaster long enough to slip onto a cargo ship or two and lift a few small but very valuable trinkets for Athenril. It's the kind of thing that helped her worm her way into the elven smuggler's crew when she was younger, the kind of mission now that lets her pretend there's nothing more to be afraid of than the incompetent City Guard. It's harder now, though. There are more patrolling templars than Guard, and she isn't willing to risk drawing their attention.

She hears screaming, a child's voice, someone yelling for help. It's  _daytime_ , though, and in a neighborhood where people usually know better than to expect anyone to come to their aid. It's only then, too late, that Hawk realizes she knows where she is. Her mind makes sense of voices and sensations and fast-moving flickers of color and shape, putting a picture together far faster than she could if she were consciously trying to process the situation. She runs toward Lirene's shop, where the Fereldan woman is surrounded by men with swords. Out of the corner of her eye, through the half-opened doorway, Hawk catches a glimpse of a familiar sword-and-flame painted onto armor so shiny and new that it has certainly never seen combat.

Hawk takes a deep breath, forcing herself to keep her mana under tight control. She slips into the room, cloaked by shadows.

"Ser!"

The young boy in shiny armor steps forward, reaching out for Hawk, but she ducks easily under his hesitant motion. "Stop," he insists, his voice shaking. He fumbles for his sword.

"Leave her alone," Hawk insists. "All of you." She tries not to let her panic show, but she isn't sure how well it's working. She'd known even before she was honest with the Viscount that he would use his son's death as free license to let the templars loose on the city. It had been a risk she was willing to take. But they must have been waiting for a reason, to have mobilized already. And to be  _here_ … they  _know_. They have solid information, and it terrifies Hawk to think of how much else they know.

The squad's leader, a bald-headed, heavyset man, spits onto the ground. He keeps his attention focused on Lirene, though he keeps his hand on the hilt of his sword, his motions much more smooth and practiced than those of the green boy he'd posted at the door. "I'm sure you're aware of the penalty for harboring apostates." His voice drips with hostility. Lirene shows no sign of having heard him. She's not one to easily crumble under vague threats. "Search the back!" the man orders. "I'll keep an eye on her."

The templars fan out, and one of them - a woman with an ugly scar marring most of the right side of her face - rips down the curtain that divides Lirene's living space from the storefront rather than bothering to take the time to push it aside.

"We're not harboring anything!" a teenage boy snaps. He holds his fists clenched tightly at his sides, and makes no effort to disguise the hatred he feels.

"Kai." Lirene gives the boy a warning look.

The templar leader laughs coldly. "Better teach that boy to mind his manners."

Kai looks to Hawk, pleadingly. His anger makes it incredibly hard to keep a handle on her own emotions. Especially as the three unoccupied templars begin to trash Lirene's carefully kept room, for no other reason than that they believe they can do so unopposed.

 _Where's Arleigh?_ Hawk wonders. Not here, obviously. Lirene is at least that smart.

Kai runs into the fray, impulsive and dangerous. "Kai, stop!" Hawk yells. Two of the three templars, at least, turn toward her. And Kai freezes. He still watches the templar warily. "Sit down, boy," the woman says.

Kai looks away from her. There's nowhere to sit. She's torn apart the small room, upending furniture, throwing down crates full of clothing and common goods, even trampling food.

Hawk's gaze flickers between the two armored and helmeted men who stand just in front of her, creating a wall beyond which she can't go. "Mind your own business," one of them sneers.

"You really are stupid, aren't you?"

" _Excuse me?_ " He stalks toward her, face curled into an ugly, angry contortion.

Hawk just shrugs, a sardonic smile lighting up her face, an insane glint in her eye. She holds up her hand, and calls forth a ball of fire. It dances and shifts in her palm, kept under careful control, but the templars react exactly as she'd hoped they would.

"You  _bitch_!" the man yells. He doesn't bother with a sword - he doesn't need one. He's at least three times Hawk's size, and he lashes out with a kick to her knee, one she is not entirely able to dodge in such close confines. She lets herself fall, and tries to catch herself as well as possible. Her hand scrapes against the packed dirt floor, but she's able to get back up again quickly. With her other hand, she releases the ball of magically created fire, throwing it toward the nearest of the templars without taking the time to aim.

She hears a cry of fear and pain, and the unmistakable sounds of heavy punches connecting with unprotected flesh. "Leave me alone!" Kai yells, as he struggles and squirms, unable to fight his way free of the templar's grasp.

"You want  _me,_ " Hawk reminds them.

"Bind her," says a cool, dangerously calm voice. The leader, the one who had been threatening Lirene. His eyes track Hawk, and his slides his tongue along his lower lip as he stares at her. Bile rises up in her stomach, along with terror. She isn't frightened of this man because he's a templar, she's frightened of him because he is sickening, and evil. The kind of man who hides the most vile of sins behind the Chantry's sword and flame.

The scarred woman responds to his command, grabbing Hawk's arm and restraining her tightly, locking anti-magic cuffs tight around her wrists with practiced ease. Hawk lets her do it. It keeps their attention focused on her, rather than on Kai and Lirene, who have less of a chance of defending themselves.

The enchanted metal is unnaturally cold against her skin, painful where it touches. And the sensation of her mana being ripped away hurts even more. She reaches for her power, unconsciously, and doing so makes her dizzy, almost sends her sprawling. The templar keeps her standing. "Stay close to me," she hisses. Hawk nods her understanding. Low spikes of pain pound through her head with every breath, but it slowly dissipates with time, as long as she doesn't try to cast.

The leader is still watching her, leering hungrily. He spits onto the ground again, and turns back to Lirene. "Grab her too. The Knight Commander will want to make sure she's not hiding any more of 'em." Another of his men steps forward to do as ordered.

Lirene lets him get close, before pulling a knife out from under her cloak and stabbing it deep into his chest, right where the heart is. His mouth opens with a startled gasp, but there is no saving him now.

The room erupts into chaos.

Hawk's hands are still bound, but the templar throws her to the ground in her haste to avenge her fallen comrade. She draws her sword, and swings it down in a smooth arc, beheading Lirene quickly and cleanly.

The last thing Hawk sees before another one of the templars pulls her to her feet is Kai, on his knees, vomiting in the shadow of Lirene's headless corpse. Her blood still spills out onto the dirt floor.

She's only vaguely aware of being dragged away, shoved through the streets of the city, her head still spinning in response to the earlier Smite.

Knight Captain Cullen is waiting for them on the other side of the narrow bridge that leads into the Gallows. "Ser Alrik," he spits. "The Knight Commander will want to see the apostate immediately." It's a slight breach of the traditional protocol, but one Cullen is certainly willing to risk to keep an innocent girl - mage or not - out of the other man's grasp. "And she'll want your written report within the hour." There. That ought to keep him busy.

Alrik grumbles under his breath, and though Cullen picks up on the templar's insubordinate attitude, he does not make an argument out of it. "The rest of you, get cleaned up," Cullen demands. The others of Alrik's squad, all of them younger and more impressionable, nod their understanding of his orders and do as they're told. Thank the Maker.

"You," Cullen says, looking directly at Hawk. "Come with me."

Alrik laughs cruelly. "Good luck, girl," he sneers. "You'll need it."

"Keep your mouth shut," Cullen demands. "And get out of my sight."

The thing that unsettles him the most is that he knows that Alrik isn't wrong. The Knight Commander isn't known for being merciful.

"Come on," he says again, pulling on Hawk's arm. He leads her through the narrow corridors of the Gallows toward the spartan office where the Meredith holds court.

The Knight Commander leans against the wall just beside her desk, and Cullen takes up his familiar place just inside the door, where he can prevent the apostate from running if she tries to. He keeps an eye on Hawk, feeling nervous even though he knows he shouldn't. He shouldn't get attached.

Meredith studies the girl who stands before her, and nearly laughs aloud. She knows better than to underestimate a mage, but still, the idea that this  _child_ has been the cause of so much of her recent distress is baffling. She's not old enough even to have been through a Harrowing. And she is  _not_ a Circle mage, that much is obvious. She is totally untrained, lacking even basic controls. The girl is strong, brimming with untapped potential, but Meredith doesn't like unknown factors, and this…  _Hawk_  is the very definition. But she's has never been one to throw away a useful tool. This girl has connections to the underworld; she may in fact actually be running a small but significant part of it, if rumors can be believed. She has connections with the underground rebellion of mages and apostates as well. And if Meredith can manipulate the situation in exactly the right way, this apostate may do far more to help the templars' cause if left alone than whatever marginal success that might have trying to mold her inside the Gallows at this late stage.

Hawk is trying so hard not to let her discomfort show, but her youth and inexperience betray her. She's confronted plenty of dangerous people in her short life, but the Circle - and the coldly ambitious woman who makes every decision of life or death within it - is outside of her experience. She's trying to figure out, within a few moments, how to handle it, what will work. She doesn't need Meredith to trust her, but she has to insinuate herself under the woman's skin, and quickly, make her  _listen_ , say the right things to buy not only her own life but that of all the mages who are relying on her and Anders to start enough friction to light the spark that is always present but always in danger of flickering out through neglect.

How much does Meredith know? How deep is the danger? This isn't something that Hawk can guess at, she has to  _know_.

"What do you want?" she mutters.

Meredith grins. It's more like the feral grin of a predator than anything remotely reassuring, but there's little point in wasting time with lies and false emotions. "I want your help," she says simply. "I know you won't believe me, but the truth is that we're on the same side."

"If you had your way, I'd be in prison. Or dead."

"Perhaps. But I'm willing to concede that you may be of more use outside of these walls."

"Don't I have a say in this?"

Meredith actually laughs aloud, and looks to Cullen, as if Hawk needs reminding that she's outnumbered. No. She doesn't have a say in this at all.

The Knight Commander holds herself with military bearing, and wearing full armor, even without a helmet, she towers over Hawk. She's trying to make herself look intimidating, that much is obvious, but that doesn't mean she isn't truly dangerous. Hawk hasn't had a lot of experience around other mages, except for Anders, but she can still feel the pervasive sense of dread and trauma that taints this place. She is extra sensitive to it, a side effect of being what she is, like the nightmares and the constant and unshakeable need to create and destroy. She channels an energy that comes from within her but originates outside of her. And because of it, people like the Knight Commander armor up against her, afraid of what that energy will make her become when she loses control of it.

There are a thousand rational arguments that have been written and spoken and reiterated for hundreds of years by people a lot more eloquent than she is; Anders has shown her some of them, as he struggled to make his own arguments form themselves into a cohesive whole. He'd given up trying to hide the manifesto and the work of the mage rebellion from her, for which she's grateful. She's not educated the way he is, but she understands that a war by itself isn't enough. Not if people don't understand why you're fighting.

Meredith Stannard has spent a lot of energy trying to convince this city that everything she's done is for its own protection. And most of the people in Kirkwall have enough trouble surviving themselves, they have very little left to give to a problem that they don't see as having anything to do with them. Anders is idealistic, and so he does a good job of rallying the few people in Hightown who are like him, willing to debate ideas and test out thought experiments.

Hawk is more practical: if anyone is going to give them anything, there is going to be a quid pro quo. And Meredith is the one who holds all the power here. So what is she asking for, in exchange for giving up even a little bit of it?

She refuses to cower beneath the ice-cold eyes of the Knight Commander, but she bows her head a little. It's easy to offer the illusion of deference in exchange for certain safety. It's one of the simplest games she knows how to play. And Meredith is more right than she knows; more than either of them are willing to admit, they are on the same side.

"You hold sway in Darktown. You can walk unnoticed there far more easily than the members of my Order."

Hawk narrows her eyes, and takes a deep breath. "From what I've seen, your templars haven't been trying to go unnoticed."

The atrocities they've committed,  _wanting_ to be seen, make it difficult for her to control her anger. And when she flares up, she does so quite literally.

Meredith is quite aware of the threat Hawk poses, and she makes no effort to treat the apostate with any courtesy. "Make no mistake," the Knight Commander hisses. "You tread a dangerously narrow path. And so does the healer you're so desperate to protect."

So that's what she wants then. The leash she dangles is short enough to choke. It's no better than Athenril. But there is no other play. "Fine, I'll do it. I'll be your attack dog."

"Watch your tone, girl. This is no gang running wild in the streets. You  _will_ follow my orders, or this offer of conditional freedom will be rescinded. Permanently." Cullen steps forward, starting to interrupt, but he snaps his mouth shut as soon as Meredith looks his way. "I'll need her phylactery, Knight Captain. Then let her go."

"Of course, Ser."

Meredith nods. "Very good."


	13. Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Maybe this can help us too. At least we'll give people a chance."  
> "And what, you think these blood mages the Knight Commander is looking for, they'll just… wear some kind of notice? Give themselves away?"  
> "I don't know!" she yells. "I didn't have a choice!"

"Drink?" Fenris asks, as soon as he reads the expression on Hawk's face. He holds up a bottle of wine with a smirk. She ignores him. Instead, she chucks a knife at the wall across the room from him. She takes refuge in the familiar repetition of the motion. Aiming takes little effort anymore, and the satisfying thwack of the blade lodging deep into the waiting wood helps her feel a little bit more in control. She's shaken. Unsettled. She'd fixed up the templar's cut on her arm easily enough, but it's not like that erases it. It doesn't change what she's done, it doesn't make her any less of a traitor to her own kind.

"You're not one of them," Fenris reminds her. "You've got nothing in common with them."

He sits on a crate across the room, watching her with an unblinking stare. His lyrium tattoos glow a faint blue in the dim light. Hawk retrieves her knife, yanking it out of Athenril's wall with all her strength. The notch left behind disappears into the mess of all the similar marks left there over the years.

Fenris snorts. She isn't fooling anyone. "You really think you're that mysterious?" he asks smoothly.

"You're not either. You hate me because I'm 'one of them.'"

"Maybe that was true once. Now…" he shrugs. "I've seen magic twisted and manipulated to do terrible things. I hate everything about it. But I don't hate you."

"Because I'm not…" Callin scowls, chucking another knife at the wall, gritting her teeth and trying to burn out her energy. She can't figure out what she's supposed to say, what kind of game Fenris is playing. She  _is_ a mage, an apostate, everything he claims to hate. She can't pretend not to be.

"You're a runaway, like me. And you… helped me. Without question. I never thanked you for saving my life."

"So now… what? You want to protect me? Be my bodyguard, the way you are for her?"

"Athenril pays me. I just don't want you to forget what side you're on."

"I don't need your help."

"Noted, Little Hawk." Fenris nods at the wall, where her knife still vibrates - nowhere near the bullseye, this time. "Forget I said anything."

"I have a job to do," she demands, as she retrieves the knife and slips it into the sheath strapped her breeches. Fenris doesn't protest. Not that his reticence surprises her. The mercenary seems to talk to her only a few times a year, and the only predictable thing about their conversations are the speed with which they end.

He returns to his familiar guarded silence even before Athenril glides into the room. She's smiling, but there's that manic glint in her eye that signals trouble. Hawk holds her ground and refuses to admit weakness. It's too early in this game to capitulate. Athenril appreciates a good fight. "You're becoming more trouble than you're worth, girl."

She's said it before, it's a familiar refrain. But they both know things are different now. They  _both_ know.

"Get rid of me then," Hawk spits. She's still got the knife strapped to her leg. It's a comfort, even if Athenril will never let her draw it.

"Go. Templars'll be right behind."

"I don't care," Hawk insists. Her voice shakes only a little behind the mask of bravado. She knows Athenril sees right through it, the elf has known her since she was a child. But things are changing fast. Too fast. The predictable world that Athenril controls is spinning away. And she's made the critical mistake that Hawk has spent years waiting for.

Hawk lashes out with the mana she's carefully gathered, before Athenril can grab her. Fire bursts to life around her fingers. "You sold me out!" she yells. The betrayal shouldn't be a surprise, but somehow, it still hurts. It hurts enough that Hawk can't see past the pain, and the righteous fury it fuels within her.

Fenris jumps to his feet, ready to throw himself into the fight. He surprises Hawk by coming in on her side.

He catches her eye just briefly before reaching out with lyrium-infused fingers, sharp as claws. Hawk nods in return, and launches her fireball at Athenril. She catches the shock in the elven woman's eyes, before everything is overwhelmed by the smell of smoke, the sound of crackling flames, a high-pitched shrieking that she can't recognize as coming from Athenril… she doesn't process much of anything beyond overwhelming emotion: shock and anger, panic, a desperate need to run.

She scrambles backward, crashing up against the hole in the wall that serves as a second story window. She doesn't jump so much as fall. The landing hurts.

She groans, and blinks back tears. A broken leg makes it impossible for her to move. Her head throbs in time with her pulse. She gasps for air. She is vaguely aware of faces staring down at her from the nearby apartments in the alienage. No one comes to her aid, but no one puts an arrow in her either. She smiles at the small victory, and she lets her eyes slip closed.

A flash of pain wakes her up, someone slapping her across the face. She tries to protest, but she can't force out anything more than a hacking cough.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Fenris asks pointedly.

Hawk shrinks away from him, but she used up all her mana and most of her strength just surviving this impulsive act of vengeance. "I wasn't," she admits. Fenris grunts, and picks her up easily, like she weighs nothing."What're you doing?" she asks desperately.

"The templars will surely be here soon, firestarter."

Fuck. He's right. Smoke still curls from the upper story of Athenril's hideout, although the fire had burned out quickly enough that it didn't spread.

She tries to twist her way free of his grasp, tries to get a better look, tries to figure out a way out of this… Even slight movements spark new agony through her broken leg. " _Fasta vass!_ " Fenris curses. "Quit being stubborn! I could leave you here."

"Why don't you?"

"I still owed you. Now we're even. Go to sleep, Hawk." She bites her lip, and keeps her eyes stubbornly open, but she doesn't seem able to focus on much. Her eyes are glassy and her breathing is ragged and shallow. He slows down, walking with careful footsteps so he doesn't jostle her. She wraps her arms tightly around his neck as he gently shifts her position. Fenris scowls down at her, frustrated and confused. He's never had to worry about people getting hurt before. He's watched plenty of people die, but he's never wanted to go out of his way to save any of them.

His stomach twists as he bangs on the door to the apostate's clinic. He hates the human healer, as he hates all mages, but there is no safer place to go.

The door behind him flings open, and Anders comes stalking out."What happened?" he asks, without looking at Fenris. He takes Hawk from the elf's arms, not bothering to hide his concern. Sweat soaks Hawk's skin, and white bone sticks up from the torn and bloody flesh of her mangled leg. It's the kind of injury that may never properly heal if left alone, but Fenris knows you don't  _need_ magic to fix it. Hawk seems to relax as soon as Anders' power washes over her, though. Fenris swears he can actually feel the crackling of mana when Anders does his work. It's the same electric tension he feels when he's in close proximity to Hawk. It reminds him of home, in all the worst ways, and he can't pull away from that sensation.

Fenris watches every subtle move that Anders makes, although he doesn't have the ability to understand much of what the other man is doing. He tells him about the fire, the fight he'd seen coming, boiling up for years. He doesn't blame Hawk for killing Athenril - he knows how much she must have been secretly planning the action, turning over the possibilities in her mind, clinging to them when she needed something to give her a reason to survive. The elven smuggler had blackmailed the young apostate for years. Fenris doesn't know what made the Hawk desperate enough to sell herself to the criminal; he'd still been caught in a trap of his own, back then. But Hawk had never tried to hide her intelligence or her ruthlessness. And he cannot blame her for fighting for her own freedom.

"She's alright, isn't she." It's not a question. Fenris can't figure out a situation in which she would ever not be alright. Hurt, sure. But she won't die. Anders wouldn't let her. He looks around, now that Hawk seems to be resting comfortably, her leg carefully mended and held immobile by a splint, stretched out on the cot where she sleeps calmly enough that Fenris knows Anders must have given her some kind of potion, or else used some kind of spell to push her into deeper sleep.

The clinic has changed, in little ways, since he was last here. There are drawings on the wall, smudged charcoal and stick figures that make it obvious that the crude representations were made by children's hands. There is a scrawny plant, halfway to dying, stashed in a corner. Fenris is no herbalist, but it's not hard to guess that he's looking at elfroot. There's a mewling sound, and Fenris frowns as he notices a tiny cat with matted fur, pawing at a plate of milk that's been left on the floor. The animal doesn't hold his attention long though, not when Anders is still hovering over Hawk with a possessiveness that can only be a deliberate provocation.

"You'll hurt her," Fenris says quietly. He notices the way the mage positions himself between him and the girl. He doesn't feel the need to call Anders out on it, or rise to the bait. He doesn't need to.

"You brought her to me to fix her," Anders snarls. "She was already hurt!" Fenris stares him down, but his lack of an argument could almost be taken as a 'thank you.'

"That isn't what I mean," he says simply. "And you know it."

The elf says nothing else. But he doesn't need to. This isn't his business. He's leaving anyway.

Anders watches the elven assassin slip silently into the Darktown streets, unable to shake the guilt that clings to him. It's been a long time since he's thought of Hawk as young, or vulnerable, but he can't see her any other way now. He keeps himself awake as she sleeps, resting his eyes for a few scattered moments, snapping to full alertness every time she moves or murmurs. He doesn't want to admit it, but he's afraid.

The underworld of Kirkwall tends to take care of its own, and that's kept both of them safe so far, but now all the rules have changed, almost overnight. There is open warfare in the streets, from the gangs vying for the gap in power left by Athenril's death before her body is even cold, and from the templars seeing blood mages and apostates everywhere for them to pin blame on, accurately or not. Lirene is dead, because of them, and there is no more illusion of safety. Grief overwhelms him, makes his stomach hurt, makes it hard to breathe. He runs his fingers through Hawk's dark hair, and kisses her forehead. And he prays, before he realizes what he's doing.  _Don't let go. Don't leave me._  "I need you," he whispers. "Please, Hawk."

She stirs beneath his touch, and her eyes flutter open.

"Feeling better?" Anders asks softly. He works to keep his voice calm.

"You know I am," she insists. Her leg still hurts like hell, but she can see clearly, think clearly. She pulls herself up to as much of a sitting position as she can manage. She uses her own mana to help speed up the process until her leg can at least sustain her weight. She won't be running anytime soon, but she can stand if she has to. Anders reaches over to stop her from removing the splint. She nods her understanding. Take it slow. It isn't optional.

He leans over and brushes his lips across hers. He can't stop touching her. His fingers brush over her skin, covered by a litany of medical excuses. But she doesn't protest, and he stops bothering to come up with reasons, after a while.

"You wanna talk about it?" he finally asks, after they've both indulged in this need for touch and contact for several long minutes. The glare she gives him is enough an answer. Anders lets her be. She needs time, and space, she needs to run away for a while. How can he blame her for that?

He can give her that. He can give her space.

But as he stands, her fingers grab for his hand, and she doesn't let go. Instead, she pulls him closer with a familiar kind of desperation, and her lips crush his until both of them are gasping for air. Hawk's hands press against Anders' bare skin, under his shirt. He feels as though every muscle in his body is tense with anticipation. She grins at him, running her hand over the hair standing up on his arms. "You've got goosebumps," she murmurs.

"Your fault."

She doesn't dispute it. She is still tucked in close to his body, and he can feel her heartbeat racing in butterfly flutters under her skin. He sighs, breathing in the smell of her, pressing his head to her skin. His breath ghosts along the curve of her neck. "Don't let go," he whispers, and she nods again. Her fingers tangle with his once again, and he squeezes her hand.

They spend the night together, skin to skin. Anders keeps his arms wrapped around Hawk as she sleeps. In his arms, she is calm. In his arms, she feels safe. He doesn't let her move too much, afraid to jostle her still-healing leg. After a while, she stops trying to fight him.

When Anders wakes up, hours later, he is forced to quickly process the incoming sensations that define his world: cold, emptiness, loneliness. He shivers as he stands up, his heart beating rapidly in his chest and his stomach constricting in panic until he sees her, just across the room. He's not alone after all, it's just that Hawk has woken up before him.

She stands in the half-opened doorway, staring out into the midnight darkness. It's only when he slips up behind her and wraps her arms around her waist that he realizes she's crying.

"This is your fault!" she demands, flailing at him ineffectively. He dodges her punch easily, and catches her wrist. She crumples under his confused frown. "I was okay before you showed up! I was…"

"Alive, but barely," he whispers, running his fingers gently down her jawline. "Wracked with guilt, afraid of every choice you made."

"This isn't better," she spits.

"Callin," Anders whispers. "Come. Sit down. Listen to me." She doesn't tell him not to call her that, this time. Some, now, it doesn't feel wrong. Hawk was the name Athenril gave her, and Athenril's dead now. Callin is a name that at least the templars don't know. It might be safe. It offers her another way of hiding.

She follows Anders' soft commands because it's much easier than thinking.

She sits down next to him on one of the patient cots, sets her feet on the floor, rests her elbows on her knees and her knuckles on her forehead. She tries to think things through. But it takes too long. It hurts too much. She is starting to lose track of all the conflicting loyalties and obligations pulling on her, and inside there is still the gaping crater she has spent her whole life trying to fill.

She jumps when gentle fingers pull at her shoulder. "Hey," Anders says. He brushes a calming spell over her skin. She doesn't resist it. Her breathing slows. Her heart rate slows. She tells her body to relax and it only half works.

Anders looks into her eyes, trying to read her. He waves his hand awkwardly, trying to illustrate to her the totality of the stress she is trying so hard to keep hidden. He can feel it. It's one of the reasons people are so damned scared of them, this misunderstanding: this is what magic  _is._ Emotion, creation, right on the surface. There is such a thin line between control and erasure.

Callin feels the wash of his mana overlapping hers, cool and cold, a slow steady pulse in contrast to her surging and uncontrollable flare.

"Talk to me," he begs her. "Please."

She takes a deep breath,  _almost_ pushes him away. And doesn't. She can't. She's lost too much too quickly, too many people have died because of the choices she's made when she wasn't thinking. And he's the one in danger now. Because of her.

Everything comes out in a rush of words, disjointed stories and explanations that tumble over one another. Blood mages killed the Viscount's son. Lirene killed a templar, and then they killed her back, and she couldn't stop them. Her father held her down and ripped power from her blood and told her it was for her own good, that it would make her strong. She killed Athenril, after the elf sold her out to the templars. They know where she is. They're tracking her. And she can't stay here and she can't run away and she doesn't know what to do.

"Anders? Are you listening?"

"I'm listening," he spits. He can't hide his disgust. It drips from every pore of him. "You're going to be one of Meredith's hunters."

"I'm not becoming a templar! I'm just trying to keep… people safe." She knows as soon as the words escape that she should not have said them. Anders is too perceptive to miss the slight hiccup in her speech as she revised it at the last second, and knows her to well to imagine that she's suddenly become the kind of person who cares about keeping nameless 'people' safe.

"I can take care of myself," he snaps. "This isn't something you have to do!"

She shrugs. "Maybe it will help, Anders." She isn't sure what she's seeking. Permission? Absolution? "Maybe this can help us too. At least we'll give people a chance."

"And what, you think these blood mages the Knight Commander is looking for, they'll just… wear some kind of notice? Give themselves away?"

"I don't know!" she yells. "I didn't have a choice!"

The utter terror inside of her is all too familiar.  _Do you think this is what I wanted?_ Fuck. This isn't fair, he doesn't want to remember this. He doesn't want to remember Rylock tracking him down in a blizzard and wrapping him up in a blanket and feeding him and not even locking the shackles around his wrists until they were already back at the Tower and their absence would require too much explanation, so he'd let her put them on. He doesn't want to remember Karl holding him and saying nothing as he cleaned up the blood after yet another beating, because he could never keep his mouth shut even when he should have known better. He doesn't want to remember solitary, refusing to talk to Greagoir even when the Knight Commander seemed to be looking for a reason to let him go. All he had to do was say he was sorry. Confess his sins. Promise never to do it again. All he had to do was lie, and he couldn't. All he had to do was give them what they wanted.

It wasn't a choice. It's never a choice.

He lets out a strangled cry, and punches the wall, until his hand comes away slick with blood and he can't do it anymore. "Fuck!" he screams, this time out loud.

Callin jumps, but doesn't fight. She doesn't reach for a weapon, or defend herself. She thinks he's mad at her, and she thinks that she deserves it.

"Fuck," he mutters again, under his breath.

This was never a good idea. She will not go anywhere good if she keeps trying to follow him.

He sighs, raking his hand through his hair. "I'm not mad at you," he insists.

She watches him warily, which he understands. Both of them have been betrayed in the past by people who promised they weren't angry, but hurt them deeply anyway. Anger is understandable; hot emotion is easy to predict, if not control. Whatever…  _this_ is, it's more complicated. They are both so scared. So lonely. But they're not alone anymore, for whatever the hell that's worth.

"I'm not mad at you," he repeats. He sits down next to her, again. This time she lets him. "Callin, listen to me, okay? We'll figure this out. Okay?"

"Okay," she repeats.

She isn't sure she believes him, but she no longer has the energy to fight against the certainty he offers.

The threats they see on the horizon are not imaginary. They are perhaps in more danger than they have ever been. But at least they can face it together. She realizes that she'd feared his rejection more than any threat that Meredith might make. She smiles for the first time since this whole mess started. Maybe they  _can_ figure this out after all.


	14. Risk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "She shouldn't be using magic at all. It makes her a target."  
> "That's easy for you to say, you're safe."  
> The betrayal in the young boy's voice cuts Anders to the core. He sighs. "I'm not safe," he reminds Kai. "Look… we all buy our freedom in different ways. We keep moving. Even me."

Anders' fingers find Hawk's under the table at The Hanged Man. He squeezes her hand gently, reveling in the simple pleasure he finds in the warmth of her skin against his, with no barriers between them. She holds his gaze with a clear-eyed stare that shows no hint of the amount of alcohol contained in the several empty tankards that litter the tabletop in front of her. Across from them, Varric is practically humming with glee. At least until the tavern's resident Rivaini pirate saunters up, winking at Anders as she holds out a hand. The dwarf scowls, but digs into his deep pockets for a disturbing amount of coin.

"You had a  _bet_?" Anders spits, around a mouthful of ale.

"Please, Blondie," the dwarf scoffs. "How does this shock you?"

"Oh, right. I forgot it was you."

"Just deal the damn cards," Hawk insists. She's fairly desperate for a change of subject. She's not at all sure what, if anything, has bloomed to life between her and Anders, but the fact that their fledgling relationship is apparently a spectator sport makes her uncomfortable.

"Alright, alright," Varric sighs. He shuffles the Wicked Grace deck with unnecessary flourish. At least the banter around the table quiets somewhat as the players' focus turns to studying their cards and anticipating bluffs.

Unfortunately for Hawk, Anders has given up any chance of winning before the game has even truly started, and he puts most of his energy into teasing her, with words and touches, until she is too distracted to play.

"Fuck it, Anders! I don't have enough coin I can afford to lose."

"Don't worry," Varric says smoothly, reaching for another drink, as another round has suddenly appeared at the table. "You'll pay me back. I know you're good for it."

Hawk rolls her eyes, but secretly she's pleased at the subtle compliment. She's done as he's asked, kept the Coterie off his back. In turn, he ignores her debts, buys her food, and keeps her hidden and well-informed. And he doesn't comment on the fact that she and Anders suddenly can't seem to stop touching each other. Oh sure, he and Isabela giggle about it like little girls, but Varric gives her a genuine smile. He approves - of this relationship, of  _any_ relationship, maybe. "It's nice to see you happy," the dwarf confirms.

Hawk rolls her eyes, feeling her cheeks warming with a flush of embarrassment. She wriggles out of Anders' lap with a halfhearted excuse. She doesn't like this. It makes her feel too vulnerable, like some stupid kid. That isn't what she is.

But even from the bar, she can't stop glancing over her shoulder, trying to catch Anders' eye. She can't stop missing his touches. She can't stop wanting him. She feels  _safe_ with him, that's what it is, so that now whenever she can't reach out for him there is an unsettling sense that something horrible might be about to happen. She picks up a new round of drinks and plasters on an easy smile.

Isabela smirks knowingly, but Hawk ignores her. And she sits down at the opposite end of the table from Anders, telling herself that she can't afford to get too attached. She loses the next three hands, until even Varric won't cover her debts anymore.

"I'm out," she says simply, shaking her head as the dwarf begins dealing again.

Anders watches Hawk as she slips away from the table where cards and chips are still being thrown down with glee, although the real wagers are now taking place only between Isabela and Varric. He frowns, torn between chasing after her and reminding himself of all of the dozens of reasons why that would be a terrible idea. Whatever this is between them, it's still new, and he is afraid of making the wrong move too soon, and scaring her off.

He can still feel the phantom heat of her, lingering traces of her touch on his skin, like fading ghosts. It's not even his turn, but he folds. He's never been good at this game anyway, and it's no true distraction from the racing worry inside. He runs a hand through his hair, trying to think things through. Across from him, Varric sighs dramatically and Isabela takes a swig from the tankard in front of her, not bothering to hide the infuriating smirk on her face.

"I should get back to the clinic," Anders manages to mumble, without looking either of his companions in the eye. They continue smirking at him, though they've turned to other topics before he's even made it through the door sealing the questionable refuge of The Hanged Man off from the rest of Kirkwall.

Anders' head feels unusually heavy, and pleasantly fuzzy, as he tromps through the the muddy springtime streets. He could use magic to purge the alcohol from his system easily enough, but why would he? He clings to every distraction he can, for as long as he can. And he is grateful for the shallowness of Isabela's problems and the smile always on Varric's face. Their idle chatter pulls him away from the haunting dreams of darkness and the crushing grind of fear and death in Darktown.

He stumbles into the clinic, rattling the temperamental lock and shoving the door inward. It hangs awkwardly off the hinges, yet another thing he promises himself he'll fix and then forgets about as soon as he's caught up in other things: the desperate people who come to him for healing, the mages trapped in the Gallows… he stays awake scrawling down his fears, and the truth of what he knows. He falls asleep only when he's too exhausted to do otherwise. A tricky door is low on his priority list.

"Anders!"

The exclamation comes not from the person Anders wanted and hoped he would find here, but from Kai. The boy stands with hands clenched, looking for all the world like he'd defend the clinic if someone other than Anders entered it. Maybe he would.

Anders sighs, leaning against the splintery wooden wall just inside the door and closing his eyes just long enough to wash a bit of mana through his body, a simple rejuvenation spell they'd all learned in the Circle as teenagers. It wakes him up a bit, at least enough to think clearly. He scrubs his face with the heel of his hand and sits down on his cot. "What are you doing here?" he murmurs.

Kai hovers near the table a few steps away, flipping through Anders' books without really seeing the contents, until Anders puts his hand on his shoulder. Whether the child is curious or simply trying to use up some restless energy is hard to tell. Kai looks different, he seems to have acquired a few years worth of growth in the month or so since Anders last saw him. He's too skinny, but they all are down here. What bothers Anders more is the darkness in the boy's eyes. He hasn't been the same since Lirene's death. None of them have.

"Sit down," Anders orders.

Kai's nervous fingers skip over the books on the shelves, but he does as he's told. "Here." He digs into deep pockets and shoves a few vials into Anders' hand without looking at him.

"Kai…"

"Don't worry, Anders, I won't get caught! I know it's important. You need it to do magic."

Anders doesn't bother getting into the technicalities of lyrium usage with a thirteen-year-old. The boy's simplification is still true enough. Without the drug, it would be difficult - maybe even impossible - to summon enough mana to help the neverending stream of people who come to him for help. The lyrium blurs the dangers of the Fade, but Anders trusts himself. At least, it's a trade he's willing to make, if the alternative is letting someone die when he could save them. Anders holds one of the vials up to the light, turning it over to watch the refractions dancing over the glass, and the liquid blue contained within. "Are you supplying Arleigh too?"

The guilt is plain on Kai's features. Anders' heart sinks. To keep them safe, he shouldn't even  _know_  about Arleigh. But the girl is in over her head. She isn't Harrowed. She's too young to have had any controlled exposure to lyrium. And if she uses it without thinking…

"She  _needs_  it," Kai insists. "She says it makes her stronger."

"Of course it does!" Anders snaps. "She shouldn't be using magic at all. It makes her a target."

"That's easy for you to say,  _you're_ safe."

The betrayal in the young boy's voice cuts Anders to the core. He sighs. "I'm not safe," he reminds Kai. "Look… we all buy our freedom in different ways. We keep moving. Even me."

Kai chews on this for a little while, sullen and silent. "Does that mean you're going to leave too?" he asks after a minute.

_Of course I am_ , Anders almost says, but something stops the words from tumbling out. "I don't think I can," he says instead.

Kai grins at him, and for a second Anders can see a hint of the carefree youngster he'd first meant. "I'm glad," the young smuggler says. "I don't want you to go."

Anders is saved from having to come up with some response to the unexpected sentimentality by a frantic pounding on the door.

"Please," a young man's voice rumbles, growing louder with every passing second. "I need help!"

Anders hurriedly pulls the door open, revealing a boy just on the edge of manhood, carrying a tiny form in his arms, a younger child, whose face is ghostly white and who breathes in whistling gasps.

Kai sucks in a shocked breath, and Anders glances at him out of the corner of his eye while he lays the patient down on another cot.

"What happened?" Anders asks, as he carefully peels away dirty clothes clinging to ripped skin. There is so much blood, and a revolting smell: decay, and poison, and infection. The gashes are deep, and uniform, as though the child had been mauled by some kind of animal.

"We were out at the Bone Pit," the older boy says, with remarkable clarity. Anders notices that he won't look at anyone, but the mage hardly has time to care. He shuts out the rest of the world, focusing on forcing enough mana into the young child to stabilize him. He can't process anything the other kid is saying, beyond a few words here and there that slip through his ears… something about a dragon. He wonders if people will ever stop making shit up and tell him the truth. It doesn't matter. He can fix things without knowing how they happened. He doesn't have to know  _why_ this kid is bleeding out, only that he is.

He knits the boy's flesh together, cools the burns, and struggles to bring down the fever that is growing dangerously high as infection rages. Sweat soaks through the child's hair and clings to Anders' skin. His head screams with pain as he reaches for mana he doesn't have. His vision swims. On the cot, the boy spasms and jerks with pain. Anders mutters nonsense babble, but he loses focus. The mana he's been wielding slips out of his control. He breaks contact with the boy, and barely manages to catch himself as he collapses to the floor next to the cot where the child still struggles for life.

"What's wrong with you?!" the teenager screams. "Help him!" He launches himself at Anders, but Kai holds grabs his arm.

"Leave him alone!" the younger boy yells. "He's  _trying_."

"My brother's going to die!"

"That's not Anders' fault! It's your fault! He shouldn't've been with you in the first place, not in the mines!" The two stand and stare at each other, an impasse just at the edge of a fight. "He might not die," Kai finally whispers.

The miner sits down on a free cot, scooting it closer to the bed where his younger brother breathes shallowly, barely conscious. He takes the little boy's hand in his and brushes his fingers over the boy's knuckles with surprising gentleness. "C'mon, little Cricket," he murmurs. "Don't die."

The boy whistles and wheezes, his forehead still flush with fever.

"I couldn't save him even if I wanted to," Anders slurs, as he pulls himself to his feet. "There's nothing we can do now except pray."

"Were you telling the truth about a dragon?" Kai asks.

"They aren't like real dragons. More like… baby ones. But they're scary enough. They got claws sharp as knives, and they spit fire. And they aren't scared of nothin'. They run 'round in the tunnels and you gotta fight yer way through 'em or you don't get pay. Cricket swore they liked 'im. And it did seem that way fer a while, they always left 'im alone. But yer right, Kai. I shouldn't've ever let him come into the mines in the first place. Evie'll kill me if I let him die."

"It's not your fault," Kai insists, wrapping his arms around his knees. "Sometimes people just die."

"This city is cursed," the older boy spits. "We never should've come here."

"I'm sorry," Kai says softly, at a loss for anything else to say. The older boy shrugs in a kind of agreement, before he lets the clinic door slam behind him. He has to get back to work, after all. Kai sits with Cricket for most of an hour, but after a while, even he can't stay.

Helpless, but desperate to do  _something_ , Anders heads for Lirene's shop. The place feels empty without her here, somehow, even though it's crowded with the same Fereldan workers and families that have always rallied to this place. Using it as a continuing refuge seems like a fitting way to honor the woman's memory.

Anders scrambles toward the counter where Lirene had sold and traded her goods, which has now become a place for anyone who has a need to speak, argue out grievances, or even, sometimes, sing or play an instrument. All heads turn toward him as he climbs up onto the counter.

"Listen," he says seriously. "You've gotta keep your kids out of the Bone Pit."

Grown men grumble and shake their heads, some of them laugh at Anders outright. "Those kids'd starve if not for the coin we get from those jobs, boy."

"It's  _dangerous_ ," Anders pleads. "Those mines killed plenty of men even before they were infested by these… wild animals."

"You mean  _dragons_? Get off it, man! Those are just stories."

"They're not!" Kai demands. He jumps up onto one of the benches and rages with adolescent fury. Most of these men let him rant. He's known in the neighborhood, and one of Lirene's favorites besides. "Walter'll tell you. One of 'em got his brother. He would've died if it wasn't for Anders and his magic."

"He might still," Anders admits, quietly. "I'm not telling you to walk away from risky work if you're willing to take it on," he says, more loudly. He tries his best to meet the eyes of as many of the men as he can, each in turn. "I'm just asking you to keep your children out of the mines. They aren't safe."

"This  _city_ isn't safe," one of the men standing in the corner of the room growls. Anders almost can't see him at all, through the press of people. "At least in the mines, you're free to defend yourself. The templars have been tearing people out of their homes, looking for the likes of you."

"Darrin's right!" a female voice yells over the murmur of the rest of the crowd. Anders' heart sinks. If they turn against him, he loses his last hope of retaining his freedom.

"Shut up!" Kai yells. "It isn't Anders fault! He's trying to  _fight_ the templars."

"Kai." Anders hisses the boy's name, trying to make it a warning. He is  _not_ trying to fight the templars. Acknowledging such a thing out loud will mean doom for many more than just him. The boy is only thirteen, but if he doesn't keep his mouth shut, that won't matter. It wouldn't be the first time in Chantry history that a child was accused of heresy, and punished accordingly. No one is safe. Not anywhere. Anders clears his throat.

"You're right," he agrees. "All of you. This city isn't safe. And Kai is right too. The templars have abused their authority over the mages for generations. Now they're pushing out of the Gallows, and taking their overzealous righteousness to your doorsteps." He stops, and slides down from the countertop. He stands in front of it instead. When he speaks again, he is much more subdued. Kai's restless energy seems to have dissipated. The teenage boy hugs himself, and stares up at Anders with open hero worship. The grown men around him have grown quiet too. "All of you knew Lirene," Anders reminds them. "You know what kind of woman she was. She helped all of you. All of us. And she never asked if it was worth the risk, or what was in it for her. She never… she didn't have to think about it. She just  _did_ it, because it needed to be done. And when the templars came here, with the intention of harm, Lirene stood in their way. She gave her life to protect the people of Darktown. The people no one else gives a crap about. The people no one else notices, or remembers. We remember. We remember."

For a long moment, no one speaks. Then Darrin fumbles for a bottle of moonshine, and holds it up. "To Lirene!" he shouts. Most of the men pull out flasks of their own, and someone hands Anders a cup. They drink to the memory of one of the best women most of them have ever known, and as the liquor burns in his belly, Anders realizes that he has sparked something completely new here. Something has changed. These men are willing to fight. Not for him, he doesn't have any illusions about that. But they will fight for themselves, and for their homes, and the templars are going to run into more trouble than they bargained for. He takes another large swig of burning liquor and feels something completely new blossoming within him. Confidence. The danger is still overwhelming, but for the first time ever in his  _life_ , he sees a shot at winning.

 


	15. Want

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's been trying for years to get the Reverend Mother to listen, to at least acknowledge the Chantry's part in forcing mages to feel as though the Circle is a threat to their very lives. In Kirkwall, more than anywhere, that threat is not theoretical.

"What're you looking at?"

Anders glances up. Not long ago, he'd have tried to hide the papers spread out all around him, but Callin's already trying to catch a glimpse of them, and who knows how long she's been standing there. "Letters," he admits. "They're from-"

"They're from the Gallows," she says softly.

Anders nods.

He's been trying for  _years_ to get the Reverend Mother to listen, to at least acknowledge the Chantry's part in forcing mages to feel as though the Circle is a threat to their very lives. In Kirkwall, more than anywhere, that threat is not theoretical. They are using Tranquility as a punishment, a method of control. Mages cower in literal jail cells, spending nearly every hour of their day alone. For Anders, solitary confinement had been the final consequence at the end of a long road of disobedience and childish posturing, and it had turned him into the kind of man that fears the darkness and clings desperately to any living person he can find that will stay with him. In Kirkwall, solitary is the default state.

And yet to Knight Commander Meredith, every mage who is forced by such brutal circumstances into taking an extreme action, or even voicing discontent, becomes a failure. Every failure becomes a warning that the system she has put into place isn't working well enough, not a reflection of just how completely it is breaking people down.

Callin picks up one of the letters and frowns down at it. "Do you know… whoever wrote these?"

Anders nods, absently, still trying to focus. People are counting on him to make sense of this information, to make people  _listen_. He and Cullen trade correspondence, secretly and sporadically. The Knight Captain too is being forced toward extremes, finding his voice in ways that Anders has to admit surprise him anew each time he reads the words scrawled onto tightly coiled scraps of paper, hidden and smuggled out through one of the increasingly expanding network of urchin children, refugees, and the poor of Lowtown and Darktown who ally with the mages because they ally with Anders and Hawk, or because they'll do anything for money.

Kai and Arleigh openly revolt, so does Anders in his running of the clinic. And Hawk is starting to take the remnants of Athenril's gang and reroute it to her own cause. The scraps of paper Cullen risks his life to write become her road map. She walks the tightrope-line of doing trying to do what she knows is right while still being watched from every direction. There is almost no margin for error. She has to buy her life, day by day,  _doing_ enough to justify her continued existence. Doing enough to provide herself and her captors both with the illusion of control.

She paces nervously around the quiet room. Her motion makes it impossible for Anders to concentrate. He keeps glancing up, afraid that her constant jumpiness means that there's a threat he doesn't see. "What are you doing?" he asks, after the third time she's crossed the room and returned to the same spot.

"I don't know," she admits. Anders frowns. It's a familiar enough refrain by this point; he'd be shocked if she said anything else, honestly. It doesn't make it any less unsettling.

He coaxes her to sit down in a nearby chair, and he sits down across from her, pointedly not close enough to touch or to threaten. He studies her, the way her eyebrows knit together as she thinks, the way her fingers twitch because she's nervous. She  _looks_ calm enough, but he knows what it's like to never be able to let your guard down completely. And she's working too hard to pretend to be fine, taking each breath like she has to tell her body to do it. Like it takes everything in her to remember to inhale, exhale, inhale again.

He leans forward as far as he can without falling out of the chair, and reaches out, taking her hand, ready to pull away again if she lashes out. But she doesn't seem to even notice his touch, at least not for a long minute. She finally looks up. "I never really figured I'd meet another mage," she admits softly. "Someone like me. And I thought if I did, it wouldn't matter. But it  _does_. Anders, I watch what you do here, and it makes me want to… do better. Be better. But... I  _can't_." Her frustration is overwhelming and desperate. All-consuming.

"Callin, come here." She does. She responds to his command, and lets him wrap her up in his arms, and hold her. He is warm, and safe. She's safe. "You're wrong, you know," he murmurs. "You can be whatever you want."

"I'm not  _like_ you. I'm not a healer. I can't-"

"You don't need to be a healer to help people. And anyway, you  _could_ be. I could teach you." She leans her head back to look into his eyes. Her fists are clenched, resting on his leg. Hope and pain war inside of her, and there is so much determination inside of her petite frame that she can't seem to contain it. Anders can practically feel it blossoming out from her, waves of powerful emotion drawing mana to the surface of her skin. She's asking for help, uncertain even of what she's asking for. She says she wants to be better, and he believes her, and it matters. Anders brushes his lips over hers, but it isn't enough. Both of them hunger for so much more.

She wraps her arms tightly around his neck and pushes her body up against him, desperately needing him to help her feel better. To remind her that she isn't alone.

"Cally," he breathes. She crushes her lips against his, silencing him until they're both gasping for air. "Cally," he tries again, once he's caught his breath. This time, she listens.

She slows down, just enough. He gathers up the papers piled up all over the bed and deposits them unceremoniously on the floor. Then, he wraps his arms around her once again, more slowly. Gently. He kisses her and guides her to the bed and suddenly the two of them are the only thing in the world. Callin presses her body against his, so closely that he can feel the beat of her heart. She's still wound tight as a bowstring, and least until he exhausts her. She falls asleep curled up against his chest.

When she wakes up, hours later, Anders' fingers are still caught in the tangles of her hair. She carefully removes them, before she rolls over onto her stomach and pushes up onto her elbows. He doesn't even twitch. "Anders?" she whispers.

He snores softly, buried in a soft nest of blankets. He never sleeps without swaddling himself in layers of protection, no matter how hot the summer nights burn. He sleeps lightly most of the time, but with her, sometimes it's different. It's like he drops a little bit of his ever-present guard. He trusts her. It's a shockingly good feeling, and one she wishes she could return without reservation. Maybe someday.

"Anders?" she asks again. He still doesn't wake. She doesn't wake him.

She realizes as she lays awake, sprawled in the tangled bedsheets, that they have come to some kind of agreement without either being aware of the specifics. She will provide information for the templars, if and when she can do it while keeping innocent people safe. But Anders is right too. It isn't simple. The uncertainty of it nibbles away at her in these quiet moments. She's never really felt guilty before, not like this. She did what she had to do to survive. That has always been enough.

Anders rolls over, reaching out for her, temporarily interrupting the dark flight of her thoughts. "Hey," he murmurs softly.

Callin takes a deep breath. "Hey. I thought you were asleep."

"Was. I'm not now."

"Okay." She pulls away from him, swinging her feet over the side of the bed. She's already trying to figure out how to get out, how to get away from him. How to disappear back into the underworld where she can hurt people and he won't know, or care, or be disappointed.

He frowns, sitting up so he can meet her eyes. "You're still…"

"I'm still fucked, Anders. I still don't know what I'm supposed to do." She wants to be better, but she can't see any way to get what she wants, not when she is constantly being monitored and tracked and threatened. She hasn't done what the Knight Commander has asked, hasn't led the woman to a single blood mage or conspirator. She's running out of time.

"I can come with you," Anders insists. "I can help."

Callin shakes her head. "No, you can't. I don't want you to." She waves her arm toward the papers shoved under the bed. "That's how you help," she insists. "Make people listen. And people need healing, still."

"I meant what I said, you know? That I'd teach you."

"I know. After this is over."

Anders nods, although he's still frowning, still worried. He squeezes her hand like he's afraid to let go. She pushes him off. There are words on the tip of her tongue, easy reassurances, but she doesn't voice them. She doesn't want to lie to Anders, promise him that she'll come back or she'll be fine. She doesn't know.

Finally, after she stands there for several heartbeats, paralyzed with indecision, she turns back and kisses Anders, fiercely, for as long as she can, like she's afraid to let go. Then, and only then, she walks away.

Her heart pounds its fierce rhythm in her chest as she slips into the narrow, twisting alleyways that hide all manner of sins. She turns into someone else, as she gets farther and farther away from Anders' clinic. The needy, desperate, broken girl is swallowed by the hardened criminal; the volatile, angry enforcer that the Coterie and the remnants of Athenril's crew have already learned to fear.

She lets a knife slide down from a wrist holster, into her waiting hand. And she reaches out with senses she's always been unwilling to risk using before. It all comes rushing back to her, as she sees without really seeing. She loses a little bit of her ability to pay attention to the physical world around her, but it's worth the trade-off to gain awareness of the energies that pulse and strain against the barrier of the Veil. She takes a careful breath, resisting the urge to shy away from the darkness she feels stirring up in the mana that responds to her careful questing search. This is what she wanted, after all: evidence of the foul and corrupt distortion of magic that proves someone is sacrificing blood and pain for power, or calling forth demons.

She shouldn't do this alone. This isn't her job.

But the templars scare her more than even creeping into a sewer canal. This is her ground. She owns this place. She tells herself that she's just going to see what she can find. That's all Meredith wants, after all. Information. Names. Nothing says she has to fight them, or try to bring them in herself.

The voices grow louder as Callin clings to the shadows, keeping her movements slow and smooth. She stops pulling on mana, and slowly exhales. The real world comes rushing back, and every rustle of wind and drop of water seems deafeningly loud. Wait,  _wind_? Down here underground?

The heavy weight of unease settles in Callin's stomach. She clings more tightly to her knife. There is wind down here, coming from somewhere else. Another world. A rip in the Fade.

"Evie,  _please,_ " Callin hears the cracking pitch of an adolescent voice. "I tried!" the boy whines. "You have to believe me."

"You think to command me, boy? I believe  _nothing_ you say. My little Cricket followed you to his death, and now you think to be spared his fate? Why should I?"

Callin swallows hard, fighting with desperate ferocity against the overwhelming influence of terror and pain that splashes over from the other side of the Veil, drawn into a swirling vortex by the creature forcing its way through.

The thing that stands there, holding a teenage boy by the throat, takes the form of a woman, but she  _isn't_ a woman. She has lost all control of herself, and been possessed by something else entirely. The demon wearing the Circle runaway's face looks up, and meets Hawk's eyes with glazed-over empty orbs that flash with purple fire. The face smiles, licks its lower lip, and drops the dead boy to the ground. The demon laughs. "Have you come to play?"

"You're crazy," Hawk growls.

"And you… you are so deliciously  _angry_."

"I know what you are."

"And you think this knowledge gives you power? Don't be silly, child."

The demon sheds its human form, fast as a blink. Without the need for a disguise holding it back, it moves faster than Hawk can follow. But it is insubstantial, and when it rakes sharp claws across Hawk's skin it draws blood, but there is no weight or momentum behind the attack, nothing for the apostate to turn against the attacker. She tucks herself into a tight ball, screaming with frustration, and lashes out with all of the undirected kinetic force she can summon. The demon is entirely unaffected. It flies toward the ceiling, offering no physical form to hit. Its laughter still echoes in the claustrophobic space.

"You are so afraid," the demon hisses. "A powerless child, desperate to escape. This world you live in offers so much temptation… so many of you who stumble blindly into  _my_ domain, and think to fight your way free."

"You're the one who's running away from me!" Hawk points out.

"You're right," the demon hisses.

Hawk whirls around. The demon has returned to something like the form of a human woman, purple-skinned now, and naked, shifting features in some approximation of the mage she had overpowered before, but also taking cues from what she sees in Callin. And for a moment, it takes on the face of Callin's mother: an image she must have pulled up from the apostate's memories.

"You're not her!" Callin yells. "My mother is dead, and you're  _not. her._ "

She punctuates her assertion with blasts of fire: pure heat, and though the demon still smiles, it does not flee. Something seems to hold it there, in the path of Callin's all-out assault. As Hawk fights it, unleashing all of her fury and rage without restraint, the demon's smile falters, replaced by a frown of what appears to be confusion. It doesn't bleed, yet it seems to be noticeably losing strength all the same. "What do you  _want_?" it hisses, as Callin traps it with an emotional overflow that the demon cannot break away from. It hovers around the apostate, trying in its few remaining minutes to figure out what makes this human  _different_. It has already been pulled through the Veil, it cannot go back, and it cannot subsist for long on this side. In discarding Evelina's skin, it has sacrificed the body that would have allowed it to survive.

"Why are you hurting me?!" the demon screams, in a child's voice. The deception makes Hawk falter only for half a heartbeat, and the demon is already too weak to retaliate.

"I'm hurting you because I hate you!" she spits.

The demon claws desperately at her, leaving behind deep raking cuts that draw forth wells of blood along her arms and legs. But there is nothing left to keep it grounded here, and soon even those claws struggle to retain their hold on the physical plane. The demon wants to survive. It wants to  _live_. " _Why?"_ it moans, as it convulses in its death throes. "I'm just like you."

Callin can't erase the echoes of the demon's dying words from her mind. She feels the imprint of the creature's fingerprints wrapped like ice around her heart. She struggles to breathe. She tries to take a step forward and nearly collapses.

"Hawk!"

She turns enough to see a templar coming toward her, all silver armor and shiny sword. " _Fuck,_ " she mutters.

Only the base need for survival keeps her going. She gets her feet underneath her and tries to fight, but she's exhausted. The templar easily overpowers her. By the time he closes into range and grabs her arm, she has lost any chance she had at resisting the Smite that is certainly coming. She lashes out physically, trying to regain control or gain enough space to be able to run.

"Calm  _down_ , will you? I'm trying to  _help_."

"I don't need your help!"

The templar still does not let go of her. He doesn't trust her not to run. Smart man. He holds her until she stops resisting, and then he sets her down, gently. They sit together in the grime and gunk of the sewers, not caring. Clothes can be cleaned up later. The templar removes his helmet, and Hawk looks into the familiar face of Knight Captain Cullen. "Are you injured?" he asks her.

She pulls up her torn sleeve to show him the deep trails of claw marks that cover her arm, and most of the rest of her body. "Don't feel much," she mumbles. "Kind of… numb."

Cullen frowns. "Poison?"

Hawk shrugs. This isn't exactly her area of expertise. "What are you doing here?" she finally has the presence of mind to ask.

"Followed Evelina's phylactery." He holds it out to her, but the magic contained within is has died; the vial is nothing more than a container full of old blood, now. There is nothing left to follow. "Is she…?"

"Turned into a demon," Hawk confirms.

"Maker's Breath."

"Did you  _know_? Did the Knight Commander know, when she told me to look for her?"

"Of course not! We would never have… if we'd known…" He does seem genuinely surprised, and so flustered that he cannot manage even to stammer out a complete sentence.

Hawk shrugs again, still not certain if she can summon up the energy to argue with the templar. "Just checking," she says softly.

"Hawk, please believe me. We really are just trying to keep people safe."

"I believe you. But you're doing a really shitty job of it."

Cullen doesn't bother to argue the point. "Come on," he says, holding out his hand, although Hawk will not take it. "Let's go get those wounds taken care of."


	16. Uncertain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "For what it's worth, I'm sorry," he says as they walk. He keeps his voice pitched low so as not to be overheard.  
> "Don't be sorry, fix it!"

"I did what you wanted," Hawk mutters.

Meredith's gives her a tight-lipped smile with no humor in it. "Do you think that's what you did?"

"I fought off an abomination."

"That should not have existed in the first place! You and your… 'underground,' you smuggle these people out of the Gallows without thinking of the consequences. If this woman had-"

"But she didn't!" Hawk yells. "She  _didn't_. She didn't hurt anybody because  _I was there_."

"She killed an innocent boy, from what the Knight Captain tells me."

Hawk says nothing. It's true, and they all know it. The demon that had once been Evelina killed Walter in cold blood. For amusement. But she's not going to let the Knight Commander score that as a win. "That wouldn't have happened if you'd cared what happened to those kids in the first place!" she spits instead.

"Hawk…" Cullen steps in before the argument can get into dangerous territory.

Meredith glares at him, but does not make a scene. "It is my job to protect this city from the threat mages pose," she says calmly. "I have neither the time nor the resources to run a charity for refugees."

"You work for the Chantry!" Hawk yells. "You hypocritical b-"

"Mind your place, apostate!" Meredith snarls. She lashes out with an unseen blast of power, a Holy Smite that sends Hawk to her knees.

Her ears are ringing, but she thinks she hears Cullen's voice. "That was uncalled for, Commander."

"Tread carefully, Captain. Remember your duty."

Sound washes in and out, and Hawk is too nauseous and dizzy to be able to stand. "But I did what you wanted," she mutters. Her head still hurts like someone is driving a spike through it. No one seems to hear her. She slowly takes a few more careful breaths, and gets to her feet with difficulty, leaning on the wall.

"Do you want me to keep her here, Knight Commander?" Cullen asks. He doesn't quite look at Meredith, keeping his attention focused on Hawk as the long seconds drag on, waiting for an answer. Meredith finally sighs and slams her fist on the desk. She doesn't like being played for a fool, or losing control. And Maker help her, she  _doesn't_ have control in Darktown. This fiasco only reminds her of that.

"Get her out of my sight," Meredith snaps.

The Knight Captain gives a curt nod and guides Hawk out of the Gallows. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry," he says as they walk. He keeps his voice pitched low so as not to be overheard.

"Don't be sorry, fix it!"

Cullen doesn't answer, not in words. But he lets go of her - lets her walk free, and although he insists on walking with her to Anders' clinic, he tries to make it as obvious as he can that he is trying to be an ally, not an enemy. His templar armor means that most people shy away from them. Others are much more openly hostile: spitting, hissing, and booing from their hidden positions in backalleys or up in second and third-story boltholes. Cullen tenses up, ready for a more aggressive or dangerous attack, but - so far - no weapons are brought into play.

Hawk is torn between being glad for the resistance Darktown presents, and being afraid. If this were any other templar, such provocation could lead to an outright riot. People could die. Cullen knows it too. He gives her a warning look, as though she has any command over these people.

Fear permeates the city, putting pressure on everyone in it, like the low dark clouds of an impending thunderstorm.

It's only when they're nearly there that Hawk realizes Cullen knows exactly where Anders is, despite the precautions he takes, keeping the clinic mobile and never staying in one place for long. He and Hawk both have bribed the Guard and partnered with sympathetic templars - what few there are - to make sure that the clinic's presence remains tolerated. The Chantry has overlooked such places far more often than it prosecuted them, in most of the cities where it holds sway. It doesn't mean that the mages who use their powers to help others go unmonitored.

Cullen pushes open the door as quietly as he can, and he pushes Hawk in front of him, into the dimly lit room. Anders sits on one of the few benches lining the wall, pounding away and some combination of herbs with a mortar and pestle. Hawk smiles as she looks around, glad that nothing incriminating has been left lying around. She pulls away from Cullen, but stops short of walking over to Anders. The healer is bristling with tension, she can feel it even from across the room. No doubt the templar can too.

"What do you want?" Anders mutters.

Cullen holds up his hands in a gesture of peace.

"It's okay," Hawk says softly. "He's…"

She trails off, uncertain how to word it, but Cullen steps in easily. "I'm trying to help you," he says simply.

Anders sets down the medicine he's been mixing and stands up. "If you want to help, leave us alone,  _Knight Captain_."

"You know I can't do that."

"He's on our side," Hawk tries to remind Anders. But it's clear in the way he holds himself - just as hostile as the refugees and mercenaries out on the street - what he thinks about that claim. Anders sweeps his arm in front of his body, showing off his still-human figure.

"You can see I'm still not an abomination. Are you happy now?"

"You know that's not what I'm worried about," Cullen insists. He keeps his voice quiet, but there is no mistaking the bitter antagonism he's trying hard to keep at bay. "I can't protect you forever, Anders. Not if you insist on provoking my people."

"I'm not the one who started this war."

Cullen stares at him for a long moment, but doesn't press the point. He nods toward Hawk. "Take care of her. I'll see myself out."

Hawk waits until the door has closed behind the templar before she turns back to Anders. And now that Cullen is gone, he finally seems to  _see_ her. "Holy shit," he breathes. "Come here." He gathers her up in his arms, trying to study her injuries, trying to comfort her as a… friend, at the same time as he scans the marks and wounds left behind by the demon with the eye of a practiced healer. Now that she's alone, now that she  _can_ , Hawk lets herself break a little. All of the pain and terror she'd been holding at bay comes rushing back in. She winces as Anders runs his finger over the deep gash that runs down most of her arm. He's being gentle, but it still hurts. "What happened?" he asks carefully. Before she even begins to answer, he closes his eyes and slows his breathing, dropping into the Fade slightly, allowing him to reach for the mana he will need to shape in order to fix her.

She shivers as his mana washes over her, with a sensation that is sharp and cold, like icy needles that work to knit her flesh back together. She sucks in deep lungfuls of air as he works. He closes the first of the many cuts left behind by the abomination's clawing grasp, and then she shakes her head. "I'm okay, Anders," she insists. "Really. It's just a few scrapes, I'll be fine."

"I can help you, though. That's why I'm here." She shakes her head, and he lets go of the mana he'd been holding, respecting her wishes. "Will you talk to me at least?"

She doesn't answer, not at first. He just holds her. "I'm scared," she finally admits.

"I know."

She shakes her head, trying to make him understand. "It's not what you think. I'm not scared of the templars, not like you are. I'm scared… fuck it, Anders, I'm scared they might be  _right_."

"I know," he murmurs again. He doesn't often talk about the doubts that had plagued him in solitary. He tries to avoid thinking about them. He tries as hard as he can to run away from them, to resist them, to fight against them and everything they tell him. They remind him too much of his lowest points, his worst days. But that doesn't mean he doesn't think them sometimes. It isn't  _all the time_  that he feels like he's forced to choose a side. But if he gives the uncertainty any ground to take root, it will grow until it swallows him. It is so much easier to draw a line, to build a wall, to decide that any man in templar armor is his enemy.

These quiet fears nag at him all through the night, until he cannot shut down their insistent voices. He slips out of bed before the dawn, while Callin is still sleeping, and makes his way to the Chantry, where he can hold a silent vigil and pray for things he'll never get to have. He needs peace. He needs hope. He needs someone to  _listen_ , to understand, to help him fix this world that is irreparably broken. And despite all of the false promises the Chantry has made, he doesn't know where else to turn, who else to ask.

He mumbles the words of the Chant he'd memorized during the unending days in his cell. They'd kept him grounded then, and though his heart starts racing as he recites verse after verse, unable to disentangle the words from the place where he was when he learned them, he keeps going. He kneels until the unyielding stone floor beneath his body actually hurts. Flickering candles provide dim light, and at this time of day, when there is no public prayer being offered or petitioners coming to seek aid from either the Maker or the Chantry's considerable coffers, the silence is near total. It pounds in his ears. He doesn't see anyone, not even templars. But they are no longer a decorative honor guard, not in this city. They are waging a war, hunting for people like him. And here he is, right in the center of their stronghold; calm like the eye of a hurricane.

He hears the footsteps coming up behind him; the hyperawareness he feels right now is almost like magic of its own. He turns slightly, responding to the soft gait of slippered feet. The woman who approaches is doing her absolute best to appear completely unthreatening. She reminds Anders of the older mages who used to teach the apprentices in the Tower, well past middle-aged and obviously tired, stuck in one place for far too many years. Except, of course, for what she's wearing, which is the full regalia of the Grand Cleric. He stares at her, slightly open-mouthed, awed despite his best efforts to squash the feeling. The awe quickly gives way to anger. He snaps his mouth shut, clenches his jaw, feels the heat rising through his body. And still, the Grand Cleric, Elthina, stares at him, unblinking, as though she is studying some insect trapped under glass.

Anders fights the urge to squirm. He's not a teenager anymore, and she has no control over him.

Elthina finally shows a bit of humanity, squinting and rubbing her brow as if to ward off a headache. She sits down next to Anders. There's plenty of space, but Anders flinches anyway. He can't help it. He's had almost no contact with the upper leadership of the Chantry, except the templars, and what he does remember of the Grand Cleric in Ferelden is mostly fire and brimstone sermons and barely-concealed threats.

Elthina seems different. Calm. She hasn't yet said a word, but she's obviously noticed his discomfort. "I've seen you here before, young man," she says simply.

"You're observant," Anders notes.

She smiles hesitantly, still tired, but the expression relaxes her and makes her appear much younger. It's easy now to see the vitality still in her. "I wasn't expecting you," Anders tells her honestly.

"You're from Ferelden, aren't you?" she asks.

Anders frowns. "What makes you think that?"

"No Kirkwall native would come here so early in the day." She shakes her head, looking lost. Looking sad. "To tell you the truth, it often seems that most have long ago given up asking for help from the Chantry. But the ones who came here fleeing the Blight… some of them still seek solace in the Maker."

"I'm not really a refugee," Anders admits.

"Oh no?"

He shrugs, unwilling to give away more information then that. His reticence doesn't seem to bother the Grand Cleric very much. She doesn't care why people come into her church, only that they do. "What are you praying for?" she asks him.

"A friend of mine," Anders says, although he doesn't honestly know what he came here for, what he came to ask. He learned a long time ago that the Chantry will never willingly give him, or any mage, the freedom they seek and deserve.

The Grand Cleric surely isn't too deeply involved in the day-to-day reality of the Circle she nominally commands, and Anders has no way to be sure what she does and doesn't know. But she's certainly heard the rumors of an underground network smuggling out runaways. The tension in Kirkwall is building, especially in Lowtown, which was already at a breaking point even before the Blight a half a world away sent its refuse spilling over those shores. The years since then have been nothing but an endless succession of disasters, each one nibbling away at any hope of stability that may have once existed, so long ago that no one can remember it with any clarity. This place is collapsing from the inside, because no one seems willing or able to acknowledge the fractures or cracks.

"Perhaps I can help. With this… friend."

Anders can't help it. He actually snorts his disbelief. "I don't think so," he manages to say, with mostly a straight face. He waits, for the Grand Cleric to push him, to defend her words, to ask for an explanation. But she does nothing. She lapses into silence again, and Anders bows his head, resting it against the back of the pew in front of him, trying to calm his racing thoughts and quell his fears. He'd told her he was praying, so he does, grasping at fragments of long winding passages he'd been forced to memorize a long, long time ago. They're all in arcanum, and the Grand Cleric looks shocked when she overhears them, Anders registers the shift in her emotions before he even cracks an eye open to look at her.

"You're educated," she says, and she isn't so much asking a question as watching him with quiet awe. She doesn't say Chantry-educated, but there is no other kind.

"I told you I'm not a refugee," Anders smirks. "I'm an apostate," he answers before she asks. It's a dangerous admission, but he's feeling dangerous now. He feels a little bit like his old self, the one who ran his mouth off without regard for the consequences.

The shock line works exactly as intended, and Anders tenses up, ready to run, as the Grand Cleric's eyes widen. If she calls in the templars that are almost certainly nearby, he's fucked. The very thought makes him panic, starts his mind racing with a driving need to erase what he's not done, to apologize, to placate, to whittle down the punishment he's earned into something he can survive. His fingers are white-knuckled around the pew railing.

And the Grand Cleric's touch is warm and gentle. She doesn't see anything different when she looks at him. She doesn't see anything dangerous. Just a desperately lonely young man, one of her own.

She sighs, and the weight of all the years that Anders had seen and felt when he first looked at her settles on her shoulders once again. She keeps her hand atop hers, and he surprises himself by not pulling away. Mages don't get the privilege of having their sins absolved in a confessional, but he imagines that if they did, it might feel like this.

"When I first was appointed as Grand Cleric, I was told that in that moment I became responsible for every person within this jurisdiction. There are many trouble souls in Kirkwall, child. I often fear that I am not up to the task of healing all of them."

Anders frowns, and now he does pull away. Elthina lets him slip his hands beneath the cover of his think cloak without comment. "What about the ones who don't want to be saved?" he asks finally.

"I believe I am responsible for them most of all."

Anders stands up, unwilling to kneel any longer. He can no longer adopt a posture of submission in this place, it's too oppressive. There are too many tangled memories he has to get out from under. Elthina seems to sense his desire to run, and smoothly slips out of his way. But to both of their surprise, Anders stops only a few feet away from the shadowed pew where they had been conversing. "Were you serious?" he asks softly, turning back to the Grand Cleric. "About wanting to help?"

Elthina meets his eyes directly for the first time since they began conversing. "I can make no promises, you understand. But I did mean it."

A surge of hope floods Anders suddenly, an alternate path becomes possible. He is still, and has always been, a healer. He doesn't want this to end in blood. He says nothing, but the Grand Cleric seems to read him all the same.

"The Manifesto," she says simply. "That was yours."

"You've read it." It isn't a question. No, he'd be shocked if she hadn't. She doesn't seem to be the type of woman who keeps herself willfully ignorant. Her indecisive neutrality is driven by other fears. "You can't ignore it, Grand Cleric. War  _is_ coming."

"Surely you cannot approve of the bloodshed in the streets."

"I don't! But the mages are not responsible for it. The Chantry dooms innocent children.  _Look_ ," he insists. What he holds in his hand is not one of the polished pamphlets that Varric has been seeding all over the city, too many for the common people to ignore; this is the real thing, raw and desperate, scribbled notes in the margins of the drawings that show the real truth. "You force a reaction. A reckoning." Elthina studies the rough scraps of parchment for several long moments before she meets Anders' gaze again. Both of them hold each other, unblinking. Unwilling to back down.

"Is that why you came here? To give me a warning?" The Grand Cleric's voice is still soft, but there is no mistaking the venom in it. This is no gentle mother, easily swayed. Elthina will protect her own with fierce determination. And Anders knows, no matter what the woman says, that he is not one of hers. He and his kind remain outside her Circle. He is an apostate, in every meaning of the word. And the reckoning that is coming will not fall solely on the Chantry.

"I came because I wanted to see if there was some way to avoid it," he says. This time his voice does shake a little.

He doesn't tell her that he's felt this moment coming for a long time, that he's seen it in his dreams. That when Rhyanon had shown him a library book with a picture of Kirkwall in it, shortly after one of his earliest escape attempts and its subsequent punishment, he  _recognized_ what he was seeing, despite the fact that he had never been there, then. It's been a long time since he'd remembered that this was Rhyanon's city too. He wonders if she's still haunted by it. She'd never expressed a desire to return. He wonders what she would have said if he'd told her where he was going, where Karl had gone. Would she have warned him? Could she have known that this was a city of death. City of chains. End of the line for thousands of slaves, built on blood. The city itself never changes, it's only the faces that do.

"I don't think there's a way out," Anders murmurs. The words barely escape his lips, he is certain they are not audible. But the Grand Cleric nods her head once anyway, and her eyes don't leave his until he has left the Chantry, letting the heavy door slowly slam behind him.


	17. Blinded

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So you don't pay attention to what's happening around you?"  
> "I pay attention enough."  
> He shakes his head, looking almost sad. "I don't think you do."

"Hawk."

She turns around, lingering under the dappled light of the low-hanging branches of the alienage's giant tree, now in the full bloom of summer, heavy with green leaves. She keeps one hand ready to draw a knife from its holster strapped around her leg - but if someone truly wanted to harm her, they could have done it already.

The elves in the alienage usually travel in packs, banding together for protection. But the one striding toward her now is alone. He holds his hands up in a gesture of peace. Long white-blond hair brushes against his shoulders - and covers his ears. Hawk frowns. "You're not an elf."

"My mother is. But that's not the point." He's keyed up. On edge. Won't look her in the eyes. He keeps looking over her shoulder, as though he can see something she can't. It makes Hawk edgy enough to actually  _draw_ her knife.

"How come I haven't see you around here?"

"Honestly? I tried to avoid you. The crew you run with isn't exactly my style. But with Athenril gone… this isn't your ground, Hawk."

"It isn't yours either."

"I know. And I don't plan to stay."

She frowns, wondering what he isn't saying, as he continues to look past her, toward the gate that shuts the alienage off from the rest of the city. It's then - nearly too late - that she realizes another human man is walking toward them. He isn't wearing armor, but his posture and bearing make it obvious what he is.

The elven-blooded young man grabs her arm just before she throws the knife she wields. She does a passingly good job of hiding her shock at his sudden display of reflexes, and focuses her attention on the newcomer. She glances quickly at her blond-haired companion, trying to gauge the threat. He man doesn't relax; but who would, around a templar?

This isn't one of the ones she knows, but he's alone, and not wearing armor. If he carries a weapon, it's not immediately obvious. "What do you want?" she asks. Curiosity and suspicion war inside her.

She isn't the only one who is suspicious. The templar looks from her to the half-elf boy behind her. "What are you doing with him? Does he know who you're working for? Did Meredith send you to bring him in?"

"Why would she send me when you're here?"

Behind her, the young man - another mage, that much is obvious now - fidgets and fusses with… something… beneath the long sleeves of his tunic. "Nobody sent her, Thrask. Let her be."

The bearded templar finally nods. "Let's go, then."

Hawk grabs the boy's arm before his can get any closer to the templar. "What are you doing?" she asks softly.

He shrugs. "Ser Thrask promised… well, I'll be safe. And so will my mother."

"He's  _lying_."

She isn't bothering to keep her suspicions hidden, but no templar should expect a mage to trust him. There have been too many abuses of power, too many times when the templars demanded obedience without offering anything in return. This isn't about safety.

"I came here alone," Thrask reminds them both. "Without weapons or armor. If I had truly intended to hurt you - either one of you - why would I do that?"

"I trust him, Hawk."

"Once he gets you into the Gallows, you'll never be able to leave."

"They let you leave."

He pushes her out of the way, and converses quietly with the templar, like an old friend. They speak in a mix of Common and the Elven tongue, surprising Hawk, who doesn't expect the human templar to know the language. As if reading her mind, Thrask glances up and meets her yes.

"I've had many opportunities to meet with the Dalish tribes on Sundermount," he tells her.

"To hunt down their mages?"

"Sometimes. More often, to trade, or to accompany our Circle mages to discussions on magical theory."

"I didn't think the Dalish were big on sharing their theories."

"The Dalish here in the Free Marches are not so insulated as those in Ferelden," the elf-blooded boy from the aliengage chimes in. "There is much more back-and-forth between the tribes on Sundermount and those that live here in the alienage. Surely you've noticed?"

Hawk shrugs. "Like you said before. This isn't my ground."

"So you don't pay attention to what's happening around you?"

"I pay attention enough."

He shakes his head, looking almost sad. "I don't think you do."

He is nearly the same age as she is, possibly even younger, but the look on his face reminds her of her father: disappointment, like he's trying to teach her a lesson she refuses to learn. She immediately reacts, all harsh defensiveness. That look makes her feel weak, and powerless, and she isn't either one of those things. This is her  _home_. She has lived here longer than she has lived anywhere, and no one can force her out.

"Go with him, then," she spits. "What the hell do I care if you want to throw your life away, walk right into the templars' trap?!"

"You mean like you did?"

"What the hell is your fucking point?!"

Her anger causes the mana within her to surge toward the surface. She drops into a fighting stance, and her knife is in her hand before she's aware of drawing it. Thrask takes a step back, holding his hand out in front of his body in a defensive posture. He may not be carrying a weapon, but Hawk knows damn well that the Chantry trains its templars to be able to take down a mage in hand-to-hand combat if they have to. But most mages don't know how to fight like she does.

"I'm on your side," Thrask snarls. "Listen to the boy."

"You're not seeing what's important!" the other mage yells, and he falls to his knees, clutching at his head and screaming as though something is attacking him. He rolls around on the packed earth that surrounds the elves' sacred tree.

"Fuck," Hawk mutters. "Don't tell me he's about to turn into an abomination."

"He isn't," Thrask insists. He kneels down next to the boy and gently runs his hand over his forehead. Hawk can feel the mana overwhelming the young man's weak barriers, though she can't see anything that appears to be an active spell. Whatever is happening with him, it's beyond her experience with magic. "Are you sure?" she asks softly.

Neither of them answer. "Feynriel, listen to me," Thrask demands. He holds up his finger and moves it across the boy's field of vision, waiting for him to follow the motion. "Can you hear me?"

Feynriel nods weakly. "Mama?"

"She's safe," Thrask assures him. And then, belatedly: "I'm not her."

Feynriel pulls himself to a sitting position, and sags against a nearby wall. He struggles to keep his eyes open and eventually falls into what seems to be a restless sleep. Occasionally, his body jerks or he mutters something unintelligible, as he wrestles with his dreams.

"Do you want to explain what the hell that's all about?" Hawk asks. She still keeps herself a couple of paces away from Thrask. He turns to her, so that he can answer the question, but he gives her the space she so desperately craves, and doesn't seem bothered that she needs it. "And who the hell are you anyway?"

"Ser Thrask," he introduces himself, properly, holding out his hand as though she will reach out and shake it. After she doesn't move, he tucks it under his arm and pretends he hadn't moved at all. He nods toward Feynriel. "Like you, Feynriel here would… likely not do well inside the Circle."

"I didn't think that mattered to you people."

Thrask sighs. "In too many circumstances, you're exactly right. The Knight Commander sees threats everywhere she looks." He sighs, heavy and tired, and the way he looks at Hawk makes her feel - yet again - like there's something important happening here that she's not catching.

She frowns, kicking at the tangled roots at the base of the tree. After a minute, she turns back to Thrask. "She lets you talk about her like that?"

"Maker, no. She kicked me out of the Order."

"And Feynriel knew that," she finally understands. "That's why he wasn't scared of you."

Thrask nods. "You have nothing to fear from me, Hawk. I just wonder if you are truly aware of how dangerous the path you attempt to walk is growing."

"What path is that?"

"You seek to protect the mages while aligning yourself with the templars. You claim to fight against the Circle, yet you are able to do so only because you remain outside of its grasping claws. You believe that this illusion of safety will last you forever. It won't."

"I know that." Everyone knows that. She can sense it, all around her, the claustrophobic shadows, the grasping claws. She has enough scars, even with her reasonably strong healing skills, to know that she's never safe for long. She glances back at Feynriel, who remains half-hidden in the alleyway, twitching in his sleep. Thrask follows the path of her gaze, and nods once. "Feynriel is… somewhat unique, among mages. Among the elves, those with his gift are known as Dreamers. He walks the Fade far more deeply than most mages are capable of managing safely."

The comment is both fascinating and terrifying. But that's not what catches Hawk's attention. She stares at Thrask, waiting for the entrapment he's certainly weaving to reveal itself. "You think it's a gift?" she asks carefully. Even  _being_ a mage, she's never thought of the powers she has that way. She'd get rid of them if she could. She never wanted them. For a templar to see anything positive in what she is seems far too good to be true.  _It doesn't mean you should trust him_ , she reminds herself. She holds onto her knife.

Thrask shrugs. "I do not believe mages should be punished for crimes they have not committed, certainly. And Feynriel there is far more of a danger to himself than to anyone around him."

"Wow," Hawk breathes. "No wonder Meredith doesn't like you."

"And she barely tolerates you. Tread carefully, Hawk." With that, he moves to scoop up Feynriel's sleeping form, as easily as if the young man were an infant. He runs his hand soothingly over the boy's forehead, and Hawk is concentrating enough that she can feel what he's doing: draining Feynriel's mana, letting it bleed invisibly into the air around them. She didn't know it was possible to do something like that without making it hurt, but Feynriel barely stirs.

"If you're not taking him to the Circle, where are you taking him?" Hawk asks, as she chases after Thrask. She doesn't expect him to answer, not really. But he continues to surprise her.

"I'm taking him to his people, Hawk. The Dalish will certainly be able to teach him to control this far better than we in the Chantry could."

 _He really cares_ , Hawk thinks.  _It isn't a trick or a trap_. And then, another thought:  _That's where they've been sending them._ The knowledge suddenly locks itself into her mind, so shockingly obvious that it shakes her. She waits for Thrask to leave with Feynriel, waits for him to  _do_ something that will confirm or deny her suspicions - but he doesn't. She tears through the familiar Darktown streets, running for Anders' clinic. If she's right, this could change everything.

She bites her tongue as she flings the door open, reluctant to reveal any information if Anders isn't alone. But the room is dark enough that she has to let her eyes adjust, and empty except for Anders, who stands in the corner where he keeps most of his things, rifling through a stack of papers and muttering to himself in a language she doesn't understand.

"Anders?" she whispers cautiously. He doesn't seem to hear her.

She takes a few more careful steps, waiting for him to react. In all the time she's known him, he's never been willing to let anyone sneak up on him. "Anders, it's me."

It takes a long time, many long seconds, before he looks up and recognizes her. "Hawk, come here." He's grinning, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet. He looks like…  _fuck_. Hawk has to let out a slow, deep breath. He reminds her of when she was little, when Carver and Bethany ran up to her, wanting to show off some discovery or treasure. Before the fever had stolen Bethany. Before she was a mage.

She tries to smile too, as she does what he asks. "I… figured something out," she says carefully. She stands there, hugging herself, waiting for him to listen. Even with him, somehow she is still afraid to be wrong. "Anders… are you listening?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm listening."

He isn't though. But she doesn't really mind. It makes things slightly easier. "There are templars on our side," she tells him. Testing the idea. Testing his response. "Cullen, and…" she stops herself before she says Thrask's name aloud. Operational security is still too ingrained in her, too important to forget. "And others. And it's more than just opportunistic, Anders, there is a safe place! A place where we can go. Where the underground can go." Anders still doesn't reply, so she keeps talking. "I met this boy in the alienage. A mage. And he told me he's going to Sundermount. That the Dalish there can teach him. That they'll protect him. He…" she trails off, struggling to put the encounter into words. It had seemed critical, when she was alone with the idea, but now that Anders is barely listening, all of her previous certainty is rapidly deflating. "I know it doesn't sound real, but… I think it is. There was… he isn't the only one to try it. Meredith wouldn't risk a war against the Dalish."

"We're not Dalish." Anders keeps his voice calm, but there's no pretending the dismissal isn't what it is. He doesn't believe there's any hope of safety.

"We don't have to stay in Kirkwall."

"I do."

" _Why_?"

Now that she asks the question, he finally stops moving. He turns to her, but only briefly, before he goes back to rummaging through his haphazard papers. He knocks over a heavy ceramic jar of ink and doesn't even seem to notice, even as it spills into an ever-growing pool, soaking into the packed-dirt floor.

"There's something else," Hawk insists. "I saw what he had in his hand. I mean, it didn't look like much. Just a rock. Like lyrium, but different. It didn't  _feel_ like anything, not magically. It was important."

"It might've just been a rock," Anders says quickly. His eyes keep drifting to random points around the clinic as he paces, picking up objects here and there, still searching for something hidden.

Hawk grabs his hand as he slows down enough to reach for one of the notebooks resting on a small table. When he looks up at her, his eyes are glazed, and his fingers twitch even within her hand. "If it was just a rock, why would he hide it?" she asks carefully, slowly, as if speaking to a child. "It was  _important,_  Anders, trust me. He told me I wasn't seeing the important things."

Anders snorts. He pulls his hand out of hers and keeps moving. This time, he starts rooting through one of his chests, organizing its contents into piles that make no sense to her. "I once knew one of the Dalish. They're all like that. Convinced they know something we don't. They're not omniscient, Hawk. They're hunted just like we are."

"They're  _not_ , though. The templars leave them alone. Otherwise Feynriel wouldn't be safe there!"

"He's  _not_ safe there. And you can't trust anything a templar says. Don't kid yourself."

"What are you looking for?"

She stands there with her hands on her hips, pitching her voice low and dangerous. The sudden change in her demeanor seems to get through to Anders, finally. He runs his hand through his unwashed hair, still twitchy, and shakes his head. But at least this time he looks at her when he answers her question.

"It's nothing important," he mutters. "Just a recipe I've misplaced. I've forgotten which reagents I need…" He taps his foot up and town, looks around the room with quick glances. He clenches his hands into fists and begins to click his tongue quickly against the back of his teeth as he looks around, trying to make the missing book or scrap of paper materialize out of thin air. The tension he feels bleeds off into the mana that lives within him. Hawk can feel it swirling and leaping, barely under control.

"Calm down," she begs him.

He looks at her like she's a stranger, like he doesn't know who she is. "I'm calm," he tells her. "Callin, I'm fine."

She nods, slowly. "I can help you find… whatever it is. I want to help you, Anders."

"I don't need any help." At least now, he's paying enough attention to understand that she's about to protest. He gathers her in his arms and kisses her, and his restless fingers tease her until she's breathless and giddy. When he kisses her, it's full of heat. "I'm horny as fuck," he whispers in her ear, and this time, she doesn't have to try to make a smile appear on her face. The simple pleasure in her presence, in her body, makes her willing to do whatever he asks.

"Anders, promise me we can go check out Sundermount, okay?"

He's still slipping his hands into the narrow gap at the waistband of her pants, pushing her toward the bed. "Whatever you want," he swears. His lips trail kisses up the curve of her neck. Callin tries to lose herself in sex, the way she has before. But Anders is too demanding, and she can't stop the worried nagging voices from whispering in her head. They go at it, fast and hard, until they are both exhausted, but there is very little pleasure in the exchange.

"Anders?" she asks, when he is spent, too tired to distract her or deflect from the questions she needs to ask. His eyelids are heavy, and he sprawls out on the mattress, soaked with sweat.

"Mmm?"

"Nothing," she says. "Never mind."

" 'k," he mumbles, as he eventually crashes into a hard sleep. Callin pulls a shirt over her head and slips out into the city streets. Her pace quickens and her heart pounds as she makes her way to the Gallows. The templars on duty there now recognize her by sight, and far from being comfortable, their casual awareness of her presence in the city - in  _their_ space - only makes her more aware of just how trapped she really is.

The dawn light is beginning to change the tint of the sky; it's especially noticeable here at the water's edge. The shops in the courtyard are starting to open, and Tranquil, dressed in simple robes of subdued color, calmly set out their wares.

"Mistress Hawk."

She whirls around, confused by the address. No one has ever given her a title before - she's  _not_ a noble. But the Tranquil, a middle-aged man with graying beard and unkempt hair, does not seem to recognize his error. She gives him a cautious nod. "That's me. I think."

"Come," he says, in that chilling monotone. "Let us speak."

She follows him to his little shop, a shelter hidden from view on three sides by walls made of heavy wooden boards. "I grow concerned," the Tranquil says.

"I didn't think Tranquil could  _be_ concerned."

"It is a common misconception," the man allows. "But I am neither deaf nor blind. There are things happening within this Circle, and within this city, that I have always wished to avoid, if possible."

"You mean like Meredith taking away your magic?"

The man doesn't deserve to be the target of her anger; Meredith is the one she wants to fight against. But the Tranquil is in front of her, and Meredith isn't. And he doesn't seem bothered by her emotional outburst. He simply continues laying out herbs and tiny jars of salves and potions. "It might be wise to keep your voice down," he says simply. "I do not believe we are at great risk of being overheard. Yet caution is always prudent."

"Fine," Hawk mutters.

"I know that you care for Anders, as I once did," the grey-haired man says simply. It is far too powerful a statement to be delivered with so little emotion, and Hawk tries not to shiver.

The Tranquil his head bowed, as if in prayer. Callin knows that it's because he knows that most mages react with strong emotion - fear or disgust - to the sunburst brand on his forehead. But she has no reason to be particularly unsettled by the Tranquil, and even he did scare her she'd still need the information he can provide.

"You knew him," she breathes out. She talks so softly that she is barely speaking aloud at all, paying attention to his warning, aware of how dangerous it is for them to speak anywhere, but especially here. "You're the one who wrote all those papers, before…" Before he was caught, and punished. Is that what she's risking? Somehow, the thought had never occurred to her. She'd always thought Meredith would kill her. But no. The Knight Commander would never throw away a tool that she could use, even a broken one.

Callin begins to breathe faster, starts looking for places to run. The Tranquil sees the fear flooding her and responds with sure reaction to some ancient memory. He sits her down on a rickety stool, and shields her from the danger she cannot help but perceive.

She reminds herself that they're not talking about anything important, yet, even if someone  _was_ listening.

She and Karl just look like two old friends, or perhaps more accurately, like a grandfather and his granddaughter, catching up after many years apart. Except that the Tranquil don't have friends. And mages don't have grandfathers.

"I'm concerned, too," she agrees, deliberately using his words.

Now, Karl does look up, meeting her eyes and frowning studiously. When he looks at her, it's too easy to remember. He remembers Anders, and remembers things that he and Anders used to do. He remembers carefully working to bandage bleeding wounds that Anders had suffered at the hands of the templars, remembers whispering about fears that went beyond the physical. They talked about demons, but unlike all of the other students he had warned over his countless years as a teacher in Ferelden's Kinloch Hold, his discussions with Anders were critically important. Karl thinks he remembers being afraid of losing Anders. And he says so. "Why are you concerned?" he asks.

"He's hiding things from me."

"Is this unusual?"

She shakes her head, immediately. "Not really. But it's different now. I think he's planning something."

"But you don't know."

"How could I know?" she asks, and her skin flushes and she grows more frantic, jiggling her leg up and down, constantly flicking her gaze toward the hidden corners behind them as though some deadly threat is going to leap out from the shadows. Karl does not feel afraid, but he observes the girl's paranoia, and matches it up to old memories. A long time ago, he used to be worried too. "He won't talk to me," Callin snarls. Sullen. Angry. Hurt.

Karl rests her hand on her shoulder, wishing he could heal her. And Callin's eyes widen. There is no mana to respond to, but if there were… he would be casting a healing spell. The desire to help doesn't manifest into anything physical, but it's still  _there_. Her jaw drops a little. Karl removes his hand, stuffing his fists into his pockets and staring straight ahead. The golden statue of Andraste flickers in the candlelight. "He's planning something," Callin whispers. "Isn't he?"

Karl nods. "I am no longer in a position to share in his plans. But yes. I am certain that he is."

"Thank you," Callin whispers, as she slips away from Karl.

The Tranquil remains where he is, aware of her even if he isn't looking in her direction. He knows there will be questions, but he is capable of evading scrutiny.

When he returns to his small room, he sketches out maps. Of the Gallows. Of the Chantry. Lesser known entrances and exits, points out places where pillars or statues or storage rooms provide cover, places to remain unseen. He will do nothing with the information, but he is used to compiling it anyway. It seems important that he do it. His memory has always been good, and since becoming Tranquil he finds that he almost never forgets something if he has made even the barest effort to study it. So it is easy to create his maps in small pieces. So far they have never left the small chest of belongings he is still permitted to have, he does not know that he would give them away even if someone asked. He does not honestly know what compels him to make them in the first place, except for the memories he has of studying history with Anders, curled up on his bed, sharing a book. Anders had loved the maps, would stare at them for for hours, visualizing ways out where none existed.

There is a sense, all around him, of impending threat, and somehow he is much more aware of it now than he would have been when he was younger. It's hard to tell how much of that is maturity and how much of that is just being able to  _see_  so much more clearly now, when he is not fighting off the push and pull of conflicting emotions and fears. He is capable of seeing what is coming. He can't see a way of stopping it, not when no one is willing to listen. They certainly won't listen to him.

He cannot feel frightened in the same way he used to, but he recognizes danger, and he is not blind to the heated emotions grabbing hold of most of the mages and templars both within and outside of the Gallows. He vaguely recalls Chantry folk praying for peace, in years past. Such language seems to have disappeared from the rhetoric now.

He spends most of the rest of the day scrubbing laundry. He frowns down at the set of underclothes that belongs to one of the templars, it seems to have an unsettling amount of blood on it. He wants to ask where the blood came from, but there is no one to ask. Instead, he focuses intently on the task at hand, trying to remove the stain from the clothing. He adds more soap into the water until the bubbles float up into the air, and he drops both soap and shirt into the tub with a loud splash when someone says his name.

Water spatters the front of his robes, and Cullen frowns. The Knight Captain opens his mouth and apologizes but Karl reassures him that it is only a minor inconvenience. "You startled me."

"I'm sorry," Cullen repeats.

Karl shrugs. "I did not hear you coming. Perhaps I was too focused on my work." Still, it is a problematic notion, that someone with ill intent could perhaps sneak up on him without his awareness. He resolves to be more careful in the future. "Is there something you need?" he finally asks the templar.

Cullen frowns, and paces the small courtyard where Karl has been working. He walks directly into one of the low-hanging clotheslines, looking perplexed as one of the drying shirts smacks into his face. "Excuse me," he mutters, and Karl is uncertain whether the templar is speaking to him, or to the clothing.

"Ser?" he asks carefully. Cullen sits down on the low stone wall, twining his fingers together.

"Karl, tell me the truth. Have you seen anything… different, within the Circle recently? People behaving oddly? Suspiciously?"

"You are behaving suspiciously now, Ser," Karl points out. To his shock, the Knight Captain barks out a laugh. It's a sound Karl has not heard in a very long time.

"I suppose you have a point," Cullen admits. He sounds tired. He sounds  _ragged_.

"There was a great deal of blood on the undershirt I was washing when you arrived," Karl points out. He is uncertain if that qualifies as suspicious, but he nods toward the tub of water all the same. Cullen frowns, but he does not get up to go and inspect the tub. He shakes his head.

"Many templars have been picking fights in the streets of Lowtown," Cullen growls. "Meredith seems only to encourage them, over my objections."

"Ser…"

Cullen holds up his hand, pre-empting the warning he knows is surely coming. "No, you're right. These kinds of complaints run dangerously close to treason." But Meredith sees blood magic around every corner, and ignores the actual spilling of innocent blood. And this city is on a dangerous enough precipice already. He is worried. And if no one will listen to  _him_ , then who in the Maker's name  _will_ they listen to? "Just… let me know if you see anything, will you?"

Karl thinks, for a moment, about his meeting with the apostate known throughout most of the city as the Hawk. He thinks about Anders, about maps and plans. He thinks about templars, and he thinks about fear. "I will, Ser," he replies.


	18. STOP

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People talk about hope, and change, and mercy; they ask for patience, they ask for time. There isn't any. He has sacrificed so much of life trying to do what other people tell him, trying to keep himself and them and everyone safe. No one listens. No one stops.

No one will listen. Nothing will happen. Anders has been screaming and scribbling and searching for solutions for years, and none of it matters. None of it has ever mattered. People talk about hope, and change, and mercy; they ask for patience, they ask for time. There isn't any. He has sacrificed so much of life trying to do what other people tell him, trying to keep himself and them and everyone safe. No one listens. No one stops, but they tell him to stop. It isn't fair, and he can't do it anymore, he can't keep watching this world spinning and racing and fighting and screaming and hurting. It Has. To. Stop.

He holds the little rock in his hand, the one Hawk had been smart to notice, the one the elves and dwarves know about but the humans have forgotten. Drakestone, hidden deep in the mines, where the Kirkwall citizens send Ferelden refugees to scrape a living from the rock, to find the wealth hidden where no one else will go. Desperate children trade these stones for days and years and just enough to continue surviving, without quite understanding what any of it is for. Drakestone mixes with sela petrae, it comes from the sewers, and no one knows its even there. It's been there. Growing under their feet, buried and unknown. The Tevinter occupiers who used to own this city knew what it could do. The Chantry has forgotten.

Such simple things, rocks and growing crystals formed from shit and piss and dirt and blood. It's always there, just underneath. Waiting for a spark.

He doesn't want to hurt anybody. He just wants them to listen. They're arguing over him like he's not even there, the Knight Commander and the First Enchanter, and they're different voices, different people, but it feels the same. He can feel Meredith's righteous fury, and she will kill him no matter what he does. And Orsino cowers beneath her icy glare, and mumbles half-apologies but he's drowning and he'll give up soon and the templars will take over the city even more than they already have.

Anders' stomach hurts and he's shaking and he's trying to count, to calm himself, but he keeps losing track of the numbers and he hears snatches of conversation and Meredith is screaming now, yelling about abominations and maleficar and that's not him but no one will even try to defend him anymore and it doesn't matter. Orsino tries to protest, looks to the other templars for help, but his voice isn't strong enough to carry over Meredith's tirade, and his weak attempts to plead for some kind of compromise go unheard.

"There can't be a compromise," Anders suddenly realizes. He says it out loud. Nobody hears him. "There can't be a compromise!" he screams. Now, Orsino looks at him. So does Cullen. Meredith stops screaming, and stares at him in open-mouthed shock.

It just needs a spark.

He takes a deep breath, reaches into the Fade. Pulls softly on the tangled invisible cords that have been waiting for him to pull them free. He yanks, hard.

And the world catches fire.


	19. Fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "They're dead because we're fighting a war. And if you give up now, then they died for nothing! And you don't get to make that call!"

The clinic is totally trashed. Panic reverberates through Hawk's entire body as she scans the room. Furniture has been upended, papers litter the floor, rough drawings and diagrams she doesn't understand have been carved onto the wall, in the little niche created where Anders' cot has been shoved away at an awkward angle. The carefully maintained stockpile of herbs and medicines is in total disarray, so trashed that she can't even tell if anything has been taken.

She blows out a long, steady breath. But the sensation of impending threat won't go away.

She reacts before there's any conscious thought, throwing a knife at the partially opened door, listening as it penetrates not the wooden wall she's used to hearing, but living flesh.

"Fuck me!" spits a familiar voice.

"Varric?"

"You threw a  _knife_  at me. Maker, Hawk. I thought we were friends."

"I thought you were a templar."

The dwarf shakes his head. "All of them are up in Hightown, I expect."

"Why? What's going on?"

"Fuck if I know. Blondie's up in the Chantry, rambling nonsense…"

"Anders?" Now the panic cannot be contained. She pushes past Varric without caring what he's saying, if he's still talking at all.

Anders, up at the Chantry, surrounded by templars. He always thought he was safe there, but he doesn't know what she does. He hasn't been out in the streets like she has. He hasn't seen how quickly they've changed, how desperate things have become. It's not his fault that he doesn't know. She hasn't told him. He's been doing all he can just to keep the clinic running, barely eating, barely sleeping. He hardly ever leaves the little Darktown hovel. Kai brings him food and supplies these days, keeping track of what's needed without ever needing to be told.

What  _changed_? Why would he leave?

If they've caught him… there's no telling what he'll do. He's always told her he'd rather die than go back.

She thinks about his clinic, the place he has poured so much of himself into over the last seven years, abandoned without second thought. Like he didn't even see it. And she understands that it wasn't the templars who trashed the place. It was him. Searching for some solution that doesn't exist. Desperate to create one.

She runs through the streets, barely seeing. Varric is right though. None of the roving templar squads that have become a permanent fixture in Lowtown are visible now. Whatever they were trying to prevent is past the point of being contained.

"Hawk, slow down."

"Shut up, Varric!"

"Fine. Fine."

Halfway to Hightown, he's still following her.

She whirls around, ready to scream at him, but he's got an all too familiar look of infuriating determination on his face, and he's got his crossbow strapped to his back. And she can't spare the time it would take to argue with him. She knows she could move fast enough to lose him, but she also knows he'd keep tabs on her regardless.

It goes against every instinct in her body, but she knows that running into whatever is happening in the Chantry without information is likely to get her killed. "I need to know what's happening," she whispers to Varric.

"Damned if I know."

"Varric,  _please_."

He gives a dramatic sigh, but there is no hiding the look of genuine concern on his face. As they turn the corner into the Lowtown market, he stops entirely.

Hawk is about to start pestering him again, asking questions, but then she sees what he does. It seems like the entire city has begun to riot.

Templars are trained to hunt down mages, to fight against magic. They are outnumbered by the masses of Kirkwall commoners who have turned against them. Their shock at this citizens' betrayal makes their defense weak and uncoordinated. Hawk watches for an agonizing minute as a templar struggles to fight off a mob of teenagers, most of them Coterie. His armor does little more than add extra weight that prevents him from maneuvering in the crowded street.

"Fuck you!" one of the kids spits. "This is our city!"

"Go back to the fucking Gallows where you belong!" yells another.

The templar draws his sword, but his movements are fumbling and hesitant. He swings wildly, without concern for aim or follow-through. He isn't wearing a helmet. He looks so  _young_. He's probably at least a few years older than the gangsters harassing him, but Hawk knows what it's like to be hardened by the streets of Kirkwall, and a templar - raised within the sheltered sanctuary of the Chantry - is unlikely to have had similar experiences. He's afraid, she can see it on his face.

She sneaks a quick backward glance at Varric, but the dwarf just stands there, shrugging slightly as he hoists Bianca to shoulder level and prepares to fire the crossbow as soon as he's given a reason. And, as Hawk jumps down to street level again, Varric lets a bolt fire. The shot is clean, and pierces the templar right through the neck. The Coterie gangsters flee before the armored man's body has even dropped.

"What are you  _doing_?" Hawk snarls.

Varric stares at her, slightly open-mouthed, and then shakes his head. "They aren't on your side, Hawk."

Her stomach drops. He has to  _tell_ her. How confused have things gotten, that she could forget that, even for a moment? "Come on," she insists.

The chaotic mob of Lowtown commoners crowds the area and prevents anyone from getting through to the pristine streets of Hightown. The templars have given up trying to keep them at bay, and instead form a human barricade more effective than any city gate.

"Holy shit," she hears Varric say softly.

Hawk looks up. Her stomach clenches into a tight, painful fist. The sky is on fire. An apocalyptic explosion of sound washes over all of them, and then the barely-contained riot surges past any hope of control. People are screaming and fighting, unleashing years worth of pent-up frustration and rage. The templars retreat, running back toward the Chantry. Sometimes, they're pursued, but for the most part, they've given up trying to fight the teeming mass of humanity that's been crammed into the streets of Kirkwall. This violence has been fed for years. There's no stopping it now.

"The Chantry!" someone screams. "Someone's blown up the Chantry!"

The fire is the sky is overwhelmed by smoke, and between the suffocating blackness and the mobs of people, Hawk feels more threatened than she ever has. Trying to hide doesn't matter anymore. The worst thing that could happen has happened.

She tries to breathe, but only ends up coughing. Tears sting her eyes as she chokes on the debris of death that fills the air. Someone grabs her hand and she lashes out without thinking, pushing outward with force and fire. She doesn't care anymore who does or doesn't know what she is. She'll use every tool at her disposal to keep herself alive. And she has to find Anders. She somehow manages to find one of the rickety stairways leading to the connected roofs of the nearby slum dwellings, and she pulls herself up, toward the sky. Once she reaches the dubious shelter of that rooftop, her head spins and her muscles begin to shake uncontrollably. She can barely see. She struggles to cast a magical barrier, and manages a weak one. It'll collapse the moment a templar finds her, but at least it will keep her hidden and protected from more mundane threats.

Down on the ground, several stories below her, she can barely make out Varric, sending out bolt after bolt from his crossbow into the weak points of templar armor, driving them back from the crowds of mostly innocent people caught up in the violence. Blood and bodies collect in the streets. The gangs do a reasonable job of rallying civilians and pushing them back into whatever tenement buildings are furthest away from the chaos and still safe.

Hawk shakes her head, trying to clear it, and focuses her attention northward, toward the hole in the city where the Chantry used to be. The Veil is fraying, pushing against her consciousness. Voices and emotions spill over and nearly overwhelm her. She swallows hard and pushes back, as hard as she can. She knows how to protect herself against demons. It's the real world that's fucked.

She presses herself against the rooftop, keeping her body low as she peers over the edge. And she draws in a ragged gasp of breath as she sees Anders.

He's mostly hidden by the smoke, and no one seems to be paying any attention to him. The chaos of the city swirls around him, as though he is somehow creating a magical buffer of space, an island in the storm. Hawk tries to see if he's in danger, if he's hurt… but there's no way to tell from here. She needs a distraction, something that will let her sneak past the crowds and the soldiers and the chaos of the moment to get to him. She wishes she had some small fucking clue what the hell is even  _happening_ here.

She jumps to a lower rooftop across the narrow alley, and navigates a maze of stone walls and rain gutters, each step bringing her closer to Anders.

He looks up, immediately, as her feet touch the ground a few long strides away from where he hides, curled up and cowering against the shelter of one of Hightown's many mansions. A broken crate lies in scattered pieces in front of him. Shattered vials litter the ground, and she can feel the magic thrumming through him, lyrium strong.

"Anders…" she murmurs. There are so many questions she needs to ask. But none of them matter now. "Anders, come on. It isn't safe here. We need to run." She takes a cautious step toward him, but he pushes her back, with magic that pulses out from him with more strength than he's ever displayed before. It's painful, as though she's being cut with a dozen invisible knives, but she looks down at her skin and sees no damage. No blood. "What are you doing?" she chokes out. He shakes his head. His eyes are glazed over and fever-bright, an after-effect of the lyrium still coursing through his body. "Anders, come on!" she snaps. "The templars are- "

"They've declared the Right of Annulment," he says softly.

"What?"

"There can't be a compromise. The only choice the Chantry has ever offered is death."

"Anders, what the hell have you done?" She tries not to let on how terrified she is. She struggles to make sense of what he's saying.

"Look around!" he screams.

She does. They are still - for now - hidden in this tiny alcove, this smoke-shaded garden of an abandoned noble's estate. "Anders, if you stay here, the templars will find you!"

"I don't care."

" _I do!_ I'm not leaving you, Anders. I never will." The silence is agonizing, it seems to stretch on forever. She doesn't want to die, cut down in this Maker-forsaken city, fighting a war she can't win. "I don't care what you did. Do you hear me? I don't care what they said. I don't care about any of it. We can  _leave_ , Anders, we don't have to stay trapped here."

"They know who I am. They'll be looking for me."

Hawk shrugs. "Look around," she repeats stubbornly.

No one is looking for anything more than their own survival. People are focused on putting out fires, or fighting against obvious targets. She and Anders can easily disappear among the nameless masses of downtrodden, terrified refugees. All they have to do is get out of the city. All they have to do is run.

She takes his hand, gently, waiting for him to push her away. She runs her other hand through the tangled sweaty hair that hides most of his face. He flinches away from the touch, but he seems a little more coherent now. "Just follow me," she tells him. "Don't let go."

After a long moment, he nods agreement.

She never lets go of his hand as she guides him into the maze of cellars and smuggler's passageways that connect the decaying mansions of Hightown to the underworld of Kirkwall's sewers. A tiny wisp of light guides their way. It takes too much focus to maintain it and the crushing pressure of the demons knocking just on the other side of the weakening Veil makes it hard to breathe. Anders spits and mutters in what sounds a lot like Chantry arcanum, but he keeps pace with her and she doesn't have time to slow down. The sewers empty out into the sea, wash out past the Gallows. The great chains that block the harbor are starting to be pulled shut. But that only matters if you're trying to escape by sea, and they aren't. There are narrow passageways that lead into the mountains of the Dalish territory. It isn't much hope to cling to. But it's something.

"Hawk!" Varric guards one such passageway, letting Bianca deter any curious passerby. "The templars have all been recalled to the Gallows," he tells her. He seems to be deliberately not looking at Anders, but she doesn't care about that, so long as the dwarf is still willing to cover her retreat. "Everyone else - everyone  _smart_ \- is gathering within the alienage. The walls are fairly defensible. Bet the Guard never thought about that."

"Varric, I don't  _care_. I don't have time for a story!"

The dwarf actually looks stung by the retort, but he shrugs it off after a second. "Luck, Hawk," he finally says. "If anyone asks, I never saw you."

She spends a few seconds trying to figure out what to say, as time slips away and the danger grows. But she can't find any words. It doesn't matter.

She pushes Anders ahead of her and follows him into the spiraling pathways that lead first to the mines and then to the mountain trails. It will take days to make it to Sundermount. Even if Anders was struggling for every step.

Hawk is forced to call a halt after the first hour. They're still too close to the city. It's still daylight. They're too exposed. "Anders, talk to me."

He huddles against a tree, shaking and feverish. He'd been drawing on too much mana, giving himself energy and stamina that he didn't actually possess, using lyrium as a substitute for sleep. He hasn't been eating.

He claws at his temples with sharp nails, drawing blood, until Hawk grabs his arm. He looks up at her with eyes that are so sunken and haunted that she can't see past them. She draws in a ragged breath and holds it until it hurts. "Anders?" It kills her that it has to be a question. He's turning into someone she doesn't recognize. Whispers and screams still tug at her from the other side of the Veil. "Anders," she repeats. "Can you hear me? It's me, Anders. It's Hawk. It's… Cally."

"Cally?" he repeats.

She nods. "Yeah. It's me. You're safe, here, okay? Just don't let go." She tucks her body against his, lets him hold her. He wraps his arms tightly around her, and as his tremors slowly subside, she gives him some of her mana, letting him take enough that he won't collapse completely.

"Cally, you have to believe me," he begs her desperately. "I never wanted to hurt anybody. I never wanted…"

"I know. Anders, I know."

"I'm not an abomination!"

"I know."

"I just wanted it to  _stop_."

"I know." The guilt is unbearable, for both of them. They could have run so long ago. She should have stopped him. "It doesn't matter anymore, okay? You can't give up. You have to promise me."

"I can't."

Instincts war inside of her. She remembers how her father handled it when she told him 'can't.' She still has scars. He'd proven to her that limits were artificial, especially for people like them. But Anders doesn't need someone to force him to push through the pain, not right now. He needs someone who can take some of it on. And she can do that, for him. She'll do anything for him.

"Okay," she agrees. "No promises, then. Just stay with me."

Anders nods, still feverish and unfocused. She kisses him, slowly, and lets him take as much of her mana as he needs to keep himself awake. She gasps as he kisses her back. "Anders-"

"I love you, Cally." he breathes. "I love you." He keeps repeating it, clinging to the words, letting them pull him back up out of the shock and pain and fear he's drowning in.

"I love you, too," she insists. "I won't let anything happen to you."

"It's too late. I've already… They're all dead because of me." He looks up at her, and for the first time since they've left the city, his eyes seem clear again. He searches her face, looking for answers. He scans their surrounding with remarkable lucidity.

A spark of hope surges through Hawk. "Anders, listen to me. They're not dead because of you. None of this is your fault. Okay? They're dead because we're fighting a  _war_. And if you give up now, then they died for nothing! And you don't get to make that call!"

"Who does?" he asks.

"What?"

"Who gets to make that call?"

Before Hawk can answer, there is the snap of a twig snapping underfoot, and a rustle of leaves. She whirls around, calling fire to her hand, ready to release it. "Anders, get behind me."

The man who steps out into the little clearing is familiar.

"Feynriel."

"I promise, Hawk, you're safe here. The Dalish offer the shelter of their lands to any mage who seeks freedom."

"Why?" Hawk asks, as the same time as Anders asks "For how long?" She glances at the healer. He doesn't believe in promises of safety. Who can blame him. He paces around the small clearing, twitchy and terrified.

"You don't have to stay," Feynriel insists. "We will never force anyone to remain with us who does not wish to. But…" he shrugs, nodding toward the mouth of a hidden cave several paces behind him. Several people stand in its shelter, watching warily. "These people need a leader. You've given them something no one else has before. Anders, you've given them hope. You too, Hawk. You may not believe in yourself, but they believe in you. They need you."

Anders looks pale, ready to protest. Ready to run. But he holds onto Hawk when she offers her hand. He stands there, steady. He takes one breath, and then another. And then he nods. "I dreamed about this," he manages to whisper.

Feynriel nods. "I know."


End file.
